Pharmaceutical promotion in New Zealand.
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Advertising↗
Biomedical subjects
J Lexchin
Publications and source records attributed to J Lexchin.
The medical profession and the pharmaceutical industry: an unhealthy alliance.
The Canadian medical profession has a long history of allying itself with the Canadian pharmaceutical industry. This alliance exists on two levels: medical associations and medical journals. As a result of the alliance the traditional emphasis of the medical profession on the primacy of the welfare of the patient has been subverted in favor of the profit motive of the drug industry. Elements of the medical profession promote useless pharmaceutical research, poor physician prescribing, and physician involvement in educational activities controlled by the industry. Specific reforms to loosen the alliance are outlined, but ultimately the alliance will only be broken when the values of Canadian physicians change.
Advertising↗
Pharmaceutical promotion in Canada: convince them or confuse them.
Currently, drug companies are spending in excess of $200 million annually on promoting their products to Canadian physicians. Although the industry has adopted a voluntary code of advertising practice, this has not prevented gross excesses in all forms of pharmaceutical promotion: drug-company sponsored continuing medical education, and promotion through the public media, detailers, direct mail, sampling, and journal advertising. Not only does advertising add to the cost of drugs, but physicians' reliance on information conveyed through advertising leads to poor prescribing and consequently to significant adverse health effects for patients. Reforms of promotional practices are possible, but the initiative is unlikely to come from either the medical profession or the government. Pressure applied through an emerging grass-roots movement is the best hope for change.
Advertising↗
Pharmaceutical advertising in medical journals.
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Advertising↗
Decline in pharmaceutical research.
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Canada↗
Symposia sponsored by a single pharmaceutical company are less likely to be peer reviewed in the same manner as articles in the parent journal.
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Drug Industry↗
Income class and pharmaceutical expenditure in Canada: 1964-1990.
In the 1970s, nearly all Canadian provinces introduced drug programs to subsidize purchases by low-income families. This study was undertaken to determine whether these programs were successful in reducing out-of-pocket pharmaceutical expenditures for low-income families and individuals, and to compare expenditures in this group with those of high-income families. Expenditures were calculated for a low- and a high-income group from Statistics Canada surveys conducted between 1964 and 1990. In the low-income group there was a 40% decline in drug expenditure measured as a percentage of total family expenditure and this was coincident with the introduction of provincial drug programs. However, the high-income group had an even larger decrease in drug expenditure. Per capita spending as a percentage of total family expenditure in the low-income group, was seven times that of the high-income group and there was no change in this ratio after the introduction of the drug plans.
Canada↗