I love the "tell your doctor about...", I can't remember which
comediant said (Maher?)... if you tell your doctor what to prescribe to
you, he's not your doctor, he's your dealer. :)

Because people don't read the fine print.

The pharmaceutical lobby is very powerful. They have in the past,
successfully bribed congress to pass laws excepting specific drugs from
patent law protection timelines, so they can continue to deny generic
labs from making their drugs.

I never take acetaminophen because it's supposed to cause liver cancer
if you drink alcohol... :) which I know you don't. I like ibuprofen,
it's my analgesic of choice.

Hope you feel better soon! At least you're nice and cool indoors. :)

Victor

This is a pet peeve of mine, too, Lori.

Theresa
Stinky Pictures: http://community.webshots.com/album/125591586JWEFwh
My Blog: http://www.humanitas.blogspot.com

CatN:

I hate those commercials too.  That little Zoloft sad and then smiley dude?
I'd like to take a brick and throw it at him in *my* /tv set!!!  Of course,
it could be that it's my fibro talking....  and I'm a narcotics addict...
so I can't take the "good" stuff anymore.

AND, I quit smoking yesterday!!

When you see those commercials...  press MUTE and carry on!!!  :o)

BTW, I sure wish you'd join the alt.med.fibro group!!

The dangerous drugs are allowed because all drugs are dangerous.  It is a
matter of degree  The question is whether the benefit outweighs the risk.
If one out of 10,000 people has a bad reaction to the drug, that reaction
must be listed.  However, the other 9,999 people who take it make benefit
immensely.  Case in point:  Penicillin saved my life when I was nine years
old, but it has been known to kill people.

One reason the horrific possible side effects must be listed is to cut down
on lawsuits.  When I had my cataract surgery, I was handed a list of 30
possible complications, which happen to a tiny minority of people having the
surgery.  I had to read and sign that before they would operate, in case I
had one of those complications.  If  tried to sue, they'd say, "We warned
you."

Bottom line, as I said:  Do the benefits outweigh the risks?  This must be
decided on an individual basis.

Joy

Joy

My remote has a "mute" button.  I use it frequently.  The drawback is
that I miss some of the program by not remembering to press it again
when the commercials are over.

If the satellite networks wanted me to hear at least some of the ads,
they would put the drug ads, and all ads featuring loud and nasty
'music' at the ends of the breaks, and the least offensive ones first
... but they don't do that.

I agree with you completely.  It doesn't seem right for them to be able to
spend big bucks pushing (and raise the consumer price of) drugs your doc
may, for whatever reason, not want to prescribe.

Take one or more kitty-purrs and snuggles as needed.  We'll send down a few,
too (purrs, that is).

Sam, closely supervised by Mistletoe

A rant of mine, even for the nonprescription drugs.  Aspirin,
acetaminophen/paracetamol, and ibuprofen all have strengths and
weaknesses. I have all of them (well, naproxen vice ibuprofen) in the
house, and use them at appropriate times.

Now, I am strongly against what is called direct-to-consumer advertising
of prescription drugs. The purpose -- when to use, and when NOT to use
-- the drugs isn't always obvious.  They drive up drug costs -- ever
seen an ad for a generic?

But to answer your point about selling drugs with potentially deadly
side effects, all of pharmacology is about balancing risk versus
benefit. There are NO completely safe drugs.

I'm not sure what drug gave the list of side effects above -- perhaps an
immunosuppressant -- but there are several aspects to look at. First,
what is the actual likelihood of the side effect?  Prescribing
information is, to some extent, written by lawyers trying to avoid
liability.  By citing every conceivable side effect (i.e., there was one
case of horribiloma among all the patients taking panaceamycin, there's
no clear biochemical way that panaceamycin causes horribiloma, but don't
sue us saying we didn't warn you).

Next, what is the danger of NOT taking the drug for a certain condition?  
For example, one of the earliest, least expensive, and widely effective
antibiotics is chloramphenicol. It will cause a fatal blood disease in
about 1 in 100,000 patients. While it's effective against many diseases,
it's fairly rarely prescribed.  If you had typhoid fever, however, you
would probably get chloramphenicol, since it is more effective against a
30% lethal disease than any other antibiotic. Chloramphenicol is sold
over-the-counter in a number of South American countries, and indeed it
causes problems.  It's inexpensive and will hit lots of infections.

I doubt you will find any advertised on TV, but there are a number of
drugs whose approved prescribing information is "black boxed" -- the
drugs are known to need a great deal of care in dosage and monitoring.
One such drug that's now in use, and was once the poster child for drug
testing and banning, is thalidomide. It turns out that thalidomide is
quite effective against a number of very serious autoimmune diseases,
and, for that matter, diseases such as leprosy that turn out to have an
autoimmune aspect.  Not only must a woman taking it use two means of
contraception, men taking it are supposed to use condoms and be sure
their female partners have effective contraception, because enough
transfers in semen to cause birth defects.

Whilst I don't agree with drug companies advertising their wares in the same
way as a supermarket - we need to understand *all* medications carry side
effects and risks. Note you wrote 'possible' as regards side-effects. Some
risks sound exceedingly serious, and are, but the level of risk attached to
them actually happening can be *tiny*. We need to understand that just
because there's a (low/tiny) risk of something happening, it doesn't follow
that it will happen. As a patient, we need to be able to understand what we
are suffering from and what the risks are that are associated with what we
are prescribed, and what the risks are if we *don't* take a medication for a
given problem. For example, the pain level may be so bad that the sufferer
has little quality of life. Yes, there may be risk of different illness from
taking a medication, but the patient and his/her doctor can well understand
that the actual risks of those side-effects are low enough that the benefits
of taking the medication greatly outweigh any risks attached to it.

Sadly, there are proven health risks attached to marijuana (greater risk of
severe mental health problems). The main reason that marijuana derived
products are not available for pain-relief is more political IMO.

Cheers, helen s

I hate the spam emails I get from the US advertising "prescription"
drugs - get them cheaper than with a script, don't they know we have
the NHS here and each drug on prescription is only £6? and we don't
have to pay to see a doctor.  Anyway I would never buy a prescription
medicine without seeing a quack first!

I'm so sorry to hear you are in such pain, CN.
Lots and lots of very gentle purrs and best wishes for you to feel much
better really soon,

<snip>