Analyzing the side effects of drug ads
4 март 2008, USA Today
... John Buse sometimes urges his patients to wait until a drug has been on the market for a while to see whether side effects undetected in earlier studies emerge. "There are a lot of unmet needs in medicine," says Buse, who is president of medicine and science at the American Diabetes Association. "Does that mean these new drugs meet those needs? Not always. Sometimes it's just new, and you're trading" side effects.
New drugs vs. generics
Visits prompted by advertising can propel patients to take more expensive, newer drugs, when lower-cost generics would work just as well, says Jerry Avorn, a professor at Harvard Medical School and author of Powerful Medicines.
If education were the true goal of advertisements, he says, public service spots would fill that need without encouraging people "to spend so many dollars on the most expensive drugs."
Even so, slightly more than half, 53%, of those surveyed by USA TODAY, the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Harvard School of Public Health say drug advertising is mostly a good thing, and two-thirds say it helps educate people. Two-thirds say there are too many ads, but only 27% say they are bothered a lot by advertising. The survey of 1,695 adults was taken in January and has a margin of error of +/—3 percentage points.
"Advertising has been a good thing," says Belle Woods, 55, of Bluffs, Ill. "If I hear of a medication I think could help someone, I share that information. Also, I hear all the possible side effects (of a drug) and think, 'Hmm, maybe I'm not going to try it.' "
Gloria Henderson, 59, of Madisonville, Tenn., says some of the money spent on ads would be better used by drug companies to lower prices, perhaps setting prices based on people's incomes. She wants to see TV drug ads banned.
Matt Carr, 64, of Manassas, Va., says drugmakers have a right to market their products. He once asked his doctor about an asthma drug he saw advertised. "He gave me a reason why the one I was already taking...
Не посягайте веднага към лекарствата, съветват специалисти.
Не всичко, което сме чували, че е полезно, всъщност е такова...
или още един опит за рейтинг на най-здравословните продукти
