15/03/2010 by admin.

A Swedish member of the European parliament, Christofer Fjellner, has acknowledged that he will be challenging many medical professionals in steering draft legislation through the parliament that would allow pharmaceutical companies to give more information to patients about prescription drugs. He said, “It is clear there are big cultural differences in Europe on the relationship between doctors and their patients. I will definitely challenge those who want doctors to retain a monopoly on information. But I will never challenge the doctor-patient relationship.”

He intends to change the thrust of the draft legislation, which was drafted by the European Commission’s industry department but which is now the responsibility of its public health directorate general. When I work with the text I feel it was written for industry. It talks about what companies may be allowed to disseminate. I would prefer that they be obliged to make information available on the principle of a patient’s right to know,” he explained. He insists that careful control of the information that drug companies may be allowed to give to patients will be needed.

BMJ 2010;340:c1368

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15/03/2010 by admin.

AstraZeneca is to reduce its staff, shut operations, and cease research into several diseases as part of a wide ranging restructuring, unveiled at the start of March. The company will close some research centres in the United Kingdom, Sweden, and the United States and is set to cut 3500 posts in research and development by 2014. It will stop all future research into 10 diseases, including acid reflux, schizophrenia, and bipolar disorder.  It warned that patent expiries in the next few years could put sharp pressure on sales

http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/340/mar08_2/c1365

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03/03/2010 by admin.

The March 2010 issue of Drug and Therapeutics Bulletin (DTB) [volume 48,
number 3] contains an editorial and three articles. The editorial discusses
cardiovascular risk assessment tools. The first article is a review of the
cardiovascular safety concerns associated with NSAIDs. The second article
discusses managing asymptomatic primary hyperparathyroidism.  The third
article reviews the use of body surface area to adjust drug doses. A
podcast outlining what is in the March issue is also available via our
website www.dtb.bmj.com.

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22/02/2010 by OmarJ.

An interesting letter in the BMJ highlights the incredible level of penetration that the pharmaceutical industry has in the mainstream media. This time they’re encouraging doctors to speak disparagingly about the safety of generic medicines.

The doctor interviewed in the original article is described as a prominent cardiologist, but the reporter fails to mention the numerous financial conflicts of interest that he has, including receiving financial donations from GlaxoSmithKline, the manufacturer of two drugs mentioned in the article. Bad reporting? I’ll leave it to the reader to judge.

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18/02/2010 by admin.

The February 2010 issue of Drug and Therapeutics Bulletin (DTB) [volume 48,
number 2] contains an editorial and three articles. The editorial discusses
concerns arising from the European Commission’s proposals for changing the
arrangements for licensing drugs and monitoring patient safety. The first
article is a review of the management of community-associated MRSA. The
second article discusses the use of ▼Pregabalin for generalised anxiety
disorder.  The third article highlights changes to the reporting of HbA1c
levels. A podcast outlining what is in the February issue is also available
via our website www.dtb.bmj.com.

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02/02/2010 by admin.

GlaxoSmithKline has announced that it will make the chemical structures of 13 500 compounds with potential antimalarial activity freely available on scientific websites to encourage research into new drugs for malaria.

For full article, http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/340/jan25_2/c465.

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02/02/2010 by admin.

 This study looks at the 50 top medical centres in the US and their policies on ghostwriting. The authors found that only 26% of institutions have policy on ghostwriting.

http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pmed.1000230

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27/01/2010 by OmarJ.

The idea that the Western world is somehow more ‘advanced’ when it comes to issues of medical ethics and professionalism has been completely destroyed by the news that the Indian Medical Council will be introducing sweeping reforms of the rules governing industry relations. So how binding are these new regulations? A swift glance at the abstract, conveniently discussed here by Howard Brody on his brilliant ‘Hooked’ blog, shows just how major these changes are:

• No more gifts. Full stop. No specification on the price of gifts, meaning even gifts as small as pens and post-it notes are covered. To those who think this might be overkill, I suggest you read about the fascinating topic of Cognitive Dissonance. (I know, it’s a Wikipedia article, but it’s a really good introduction to the topic.)
• No more grants. Full stop. It doesn’t matter what they’re being paid for, Indian doctors will no longer be allowed to receive money from the pharmaceutical industry.  Funding for medical research must be approved by the necessary institutions, and information on these transactions will be in the public domain.
• No drug endorsements. This has been in effect since 2002.
• Violation of any of these rules will be treated as ‘Misconduct’, which means they can be punishable with penalties and possible suspension.

All in all, this is a huge step in ensuring public trust in the medical profession in India is retained.

Thanks, India, for showing the rest of the world that it is possible to stand up to the self-serving logic that has perpetuated these unethical practices for so long. It’s time the Western World stood up and noticed.

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26/01/2010 by admin.

The marketing team sued over a drug’s alleged side effects tried to suppress key data, an ex-employee has claimed.

Seroquel’s former UK medical adviser told the BBC he was pressured to approve promotional material which said weight gain was not an issue.

Maker AstraZeneca, which faces fresh legal action next month, said it took concerns about its conduct seriously.

In the same programme, the British Medical Journal editor urged that the medicine licensing system be reviewed.

Dr Fiona Godlee said industry should no longer provide the evaluations of its own drugs which the licensing body considered.

For full article go to, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8478924.stm

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24/01/2010 by OmarJ.

The lawyers and settlements blog has a great article that gives a good little synopsis of the arguments against direct-to-consumer advertising in the US, or as we call it in Europe, information to patients. It strikes me as an odd source for a feature on this blog, but I won’t let that get in the way of my enjoying a well written, rational article.While I highly recommend you go there and read it, here are a few of the main points made in the article:

• Industry spending on marketing went up from $11 billion in 1996 to $30 billion in 2005
• Between 1999 and 2000, sales of advertised drugs increased by 24% (!!!), compared with just 4.3% for non-advertised drugs.
• Most interestingly, several states are proposing legislation that will curb direct to consumer advertising, or, at least, force pharmaceutical companies to be more open about their marketing practices. Good progress, I say.

It’s really easy to downplay the effects that marketing practices have. After all, how could a simple advert have such a profound effect on consumer practice? But the evidence speaks for itself, and companies wouldn’t be spending so much money on marketing if it didn’t work.The upside of that is, if marketing is the reason that some drugs do well, where does that leave evidence-based medicine?

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