« December 2006 | Main | August 2007 »
"[Prescription drug ads are] really intruding onto the doctor-patient relationship... What the ads tend to do is take up time and energy during a visit that could otherwise be spent on things that are important to the patient."
Doctor Stange is professor of family medicine at Case Western Reserve University and editor of the Annals of Family Medicine.
Source: Could Drug Ads be Bad for Your Health? (ABC News)
"The ads do rely almost universally on the consumers' emotions... Medical decisions shouldn't be about emotions. They should be on carefully weighed benefits, risks and costs."
Doctor Frosch is an assistant professor of general internal medicine at UCLA. He also said:
"Doctors in surveys have said that they have provided drugs even when the prescription wasn't appropriate... If consumers were powerless in changing the views of the doctors, the pharmaceutical industry would not be spending money advertising to them. It works."
Source: Could Drug Ads be Bad for Your Health? (ABC News)
Editor's Note: Prescription drug advertising contributes to higher drug prices in the United States and is banned in nearly all other Western countries. Please read Why are Canadian Drug Prices Lower? for details.
