Comments on: Pharma Gifts to Doctors Raise Ethical Questions http://trishatorrey.com/2007/05/01/pharma-gifts-to-doctors-raise-ethical-questions/ A blog about patient empowerment, advocacy, safety, consumerism and tools to navigate the dysfunction of American health care. Fri, 10 Feb 2012 03:08:52 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Mary Reynolds http://trishatorrey.com/2007/05/01/pharma-gifts-to-doctors-raise-ethical-questions/comment-page-1/#comment-318 Mary Reynolds Wed, 02 May 2007 11:18:46 +0000 http://trishatorrey.com/?p=245#comment-318 I feel this practice is downright unethical and is just a form of bribery to get the latest most expensive drugs prescribed as much as possible whether they are the best treatment or not. Somebody has to pay for all those TV commercials and expensive magazine ads. And let's not forget how careless the FDA has been in recent years in approving drugs that later had to be removed from the market. I myself would rather have a tried and true drug that had been on the market for years instead of the latest "pill of the month" prescribed for whatever ailment the doctor is supposedly trying to treat. Last but not least, there is rampant "off-label" prescribing of a lot of drugs, especially the newer overpriced antidepressants and antipsychotics. Doctors want to give you antidepressants instead of actual pain medication even when you have a legitimate pain condition proven by records. They would rather give you Seroquel for sleep than a legitimate sleeping pill even though this drug has been proven to cause diabetes in some patients and it is also very expensive. Why should we be ginea pigs for this sort of thing just because of this legal bribery the drug companies are allowed to commit? I feel this practice is downright unethical and is just a form of bribery to get the latest most expensive drugs prescribed as much as possible whether they are the best treatment or not. Somebody has to pay for all those TV commercials and expensive magazine ads.

And let’s not forget how careless the FDA has been in recent years in approving drugs that later had to be removed from the market. I myself would rather have a tried and true drug that had been on the market for years instead of the latest “pill of the month” prescribed for whatever ailment the doctor is supposedly trying to treat.

Last but not least, there is rampant “off-label” prescribing of a lot of drugs, especially the newer overpriced antidepressants and antipsychotics. Doctors want to give you antidepressants instead of actual pain medication even when you have a legitimate pain condition proven by records. They would rather give you Seroquel for sleep than a legitimate sleeping pill even though this drug has been proven to cause diabetes in some patients and it is also very expensive. Why should we be ginea pigs for this sort of thing just because of this legal bribery the drug companies are allowed to commit?

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