Can Pharmaceuticals Legally Sell Drugs?
This is the question that I asked myself (yet again) when I read that two major pharmaceuticals have (yet again) evidenced that the only way that pharmaceuticals seem able to sell durgs is by doing something illegal. Amgen recently plead guilty to illegally marketing Aranesp for off-label uses and will pay $150 million in criminal … Continue reading
When Doctors’ Orders Are Not Followed: Are Co-Pay Cards Kick-Backs or Just Good Marketing?
Co-pay cards provide patients a discount off all or part of the co-pay that they would otherwise have to pay. Saving money — it sounds like a good idea for patients, right? Community Catalyst, an “organization working to build the consumer and community leadership that is required to transform the American health system”, disagrees. Community … Continue reading
Is good pharmaceutical marketing possible?
14 years ago (on August 8, 1997, no less), the FDA issued guidelines that allowed for drug manufacturers to advertise. As the NY Times reported that day, Michael Friedman (then FDA’s lead deputy commissioner) had this is to say about the reason for the guidelines: Today’s action can help promote greater consumer awareness about prescription … Continue reading
Is social media good for patient care?
Searching for healthcare information continues to play a key role for using the Internet. According to The Pew Internet Project and California HealthCare Foundation study, “Eight-in-ten internet users look online for health information, making it the third most popular online pursuit … following email and using a search engine.” However, while social media can help … Continue reading
Cancer Drug Use and Spending to Rise Sharply by 2013
What are the implications of increased drug use and spending? In a recent report by Medco, while the overall drug trend in 2010 remained low at 3.7%, the costs for specialty drugs “accounted for 16.3% of plan costs but was responsible for a remarkable 70.1% of drug trend” with diabetes contributing the most to those … Continue reading
Who profits from improved patient adherence?
Aside from patients who get better health outcomes because of better adherence, who profits (either from increased revenues or lower expenses) from improved patient adherence? On the revenue side are the pharmaceuticals. The simplest and most straight-forward answer is that pharmaceuticals would profit the most. After all, more adherence means more product usage, which means … Continue reading
Trust or not trust pharmaceuticals — is there a place for branded marketing?
To paraphrase Hamlet — to trust or not trust pharmaceuticals, that is the question. A recent study shows that use of pharmaceutical branded websites are on the rise, based on web activity from January 2010 to January 2011 as measured by comScore and as illustrated below: Moreover, comScore “found that visitation to a branded website … Continue reading
The value of friends in a battle: Terry Kalley and the Genentech Avastin battle with the FDA
On December 16, 2010, the FDA issued a press release regarding the Genentech drug Avastin. The headline to the release says it all: FDA begins process to remove breast cancer indication from Avastin label: Drug not shown to be safe and effective in breast cancer patients On Genentech’s side are Washington lawyers, lobbyists and a national … Continue reading
Can a Patient Adherence Program be Self-Funded?
According to the report “Ensuring Profitable Patient Adherence Programs: Using Analytics and Metrics to Improve the Bottom Line”, pharmaceutical companies spend nearly 97% of their marketing budget to capture initial market share. This means that 3% of their marketing budget is devoted to on-going efforts, like patient adherence. As the report’s author, Dr Andree Bates, … Continue reading
Is it alright to pay people to blog about a product?
Abbott recently put out an app for the iPhone regarding its infant formula Similac. The app “can easily track baby’s eating, sleeping … diaper changes … [and] predict the next feeding time”. Now the controversy of formula substituting for breast milk is an old one. My dad, who was with UNICEF, was one of the … Continue reading
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