Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Tables
- Figures
- About the Editors
- Contributors
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Foreword
- Introduction: Charting a Sustainable Path for the Twenty-First Century Pharmaceutical Industry
- PART I PROFITS, PATIENTS' RIGHTS, AND SCIENTIFIC PROGRESS: THE ETHICS OF CLINICAL RESEARCH CONDUCTED IN PRIVATE ENTERPRISES
- PART II MARKETING AND THE EFFICIENT UTILIZATION OF HEALTHCARE RESOURCES: ETHICAL AND PUBLIC POLICY CHALLENGES
- Introduction to Part II
- 8 Ethics and Prescribing: The Clinician's Perspective
- 9 The Regulation of Prescription Drug Promotion
- 10 Direct-to-Consumer Advertising of Prescription Drugs: A Policy Dilemma
- 11 Off-Label Communications and Prescription Drugs
- 12 The Need for Better Health Information: Advancing the Informed Patient in Europe
- 13 Who Should Get Access to Which Drugs? An Ethical Template for Pharmacy Benefits
- 14 The Application of Cost-Effectiveness and Cost–Benefit Analysis to Pharmaceuticals
- PART III PATENTS, PRICING, AND EQUAL ACCESS
- PART IV CONCLUDING THOUGHTS: CHARTING A SUSTAINABLE PATH FOR THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY
- Notes
- Index
9 - The Regulation of Prescription Drug Promotion
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 December 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Tables
- Figures
- About the Editors
- Contributors
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Foreword
- Introduction: Charting a Sustainable Path for the Twenty-First Century Pharmaceutical Industry
- PART I PROFITS, PATIENTS' RIGHTS, AND SCIENTIFIC PROGRESS: THE ETHICS OF CLINICAL RESEARCH CONDUCTED IN PRIVATE ENTERPRISES
- PART II MARKETING AND THE EFFICIENT UTILIZATION OF HEALTHCARE RESOURCES: ETHICAL AND PUBLIC POLICY CHALLENGES
- Introduction to Part II
- 8 Ethics and Prescribing: The Clinician's Perspective
- 9 The Regulation of Prescription Drug Promotion
- 10 Direct-to-Consumer Advertising of Prescription Drugs: A Policy Dilemma
- 11 Off-Label Communications and Prescription Drugs
- 12 The Need for Better Health Information: Advancing the Informed Patient in Europe
- 13 Who Should Get Access to Which Drugs? An Ethical Template for Pharmacy Benefits
- 14 The Application of Cost-Effectiveness and Cost–Benefit Analysis to Pharmaceuticals
- PART III PATENTS, PRICING, AND EQUAL ACCESS
- PART IV CONCLUDING THOUGHTS: CHARTING A SUSTAINABLE PATH FOR THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY
- Notes
- Index
Summary
INTRODUCTION
You are in the reception room of your physician's office with other patients waiting for your turn with the doctor. You are looking around the room – doing a little people watching – and you notice a well-dressed young woman carrying a brown bag that looks like a book bag from your elementary school days. You then observe that the young woman is called into the physician's office but is told by the receptionist that “the doctor only has a few minutes, so you need to be quick.” When you are later escorted into an examination room by one of the nurses, you pass the young woman, who is taking cartons out of her book bag briefcase and talking to the doctor. What you have witnessed is one of the many ways that pharmaceutical companies promote their prescription drug products. This chapter will describe the various ways in which companies promote prescription drugs and how the government regulates this promotion.
The marketing of prescription drugs is a significant business. Prescription drug sales in the United States alone were $228.8 billion in 2003. So even small shifts in sales from one product to another can result in millions of dollars of added or reduced revenue for a company. Companies are therefore aggressive in their promotion of prescription drugs. In addition, there does not appear to be any slowing down or leveling off of drug company expenditures on promotion.
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- Information
- Ethics and the Pharmaceutical Industry , pp. 153 - 168Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2005