Perhaps the most sophisticated critique is that drugs shouldn’t be widely promoted until they’ve been on the market long enough to ensure that risks are understood. But there’s a big question there too: Can we truly discover useful information about real-world risks without exposing patients to risk?

Ads should be accurate, but in the long run the real issue is whether they drive appropriate or inappropriate prescribing. And despite the analysis DTC has been subjected to, that’s apparently not yet known, or even likely to be known.

In the meantime, one of the great pleasures of grubbing through congressional testimony is the discovery of fascinating, quotable tidbits. Here are a few from the DTC hearing: (more…)

The initiative so far consists of a just-launched wiki—and, as such, leaves a little to be desired in terms of content. But the tools are all there, explained the site’s developer, urging everyone in the audience who had resource supplies or demands to sign up, make connections, and work toward new solutions for dire problems such as poverty, disease, hunger, and climate change in sub-Saharan Africa and other places. (more…)

Late last week, the company announced that it was laying off roughly half of its workforce. Tyson is gone. And Viramidine, now known as Taribavirin is, well, just around the corner. What went wrong? (more…)

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The big news out of AC is the release of Microsoft’s Office for Business Applications (OBA) for the life sciences industry. This set of tools allows software developers to build applications that seamlessly connect back-end enterprise systems with MS Office program. (more…)

Called “The Toxic Pipeline,” the series is a truly groundbreaking investigation into the counterfeit, adulterated, and dangerous drugs that are made in China and sold to an unsuspecting world. Reporters Walt Bogdanich and Jake Hooker spent the better part of the past year tracking the drug industry’s global supply chain across four continents to locate its faulty links where no regulation of corrupt officials facilitate a crisis level of contamination. (more…)

It’s the second day of the 19th Annual PRSA Health Academy meeting in Chicago and the morning has provided more valuable learnings. Ed Schipul, CEO of Schipul – The Web Marketing Company, gave a great analogy in his talk: He says joining the blogosphere after a crisis is like saying “I didn’t kill him” as you stand over a dead body. And working in pharma, we know, eventually, there will be a crisis.

I’ve been having quite a few conversations with my pharma clients and friends about how best to join the conversation. Many of us are doing that through vehicles that allow us more control (and therefore less risk) over the content – like podcasts and e-newsletters. (more…)

I’m coming to you from the 19th Annual PRSA Health Academy meeting in Chicago. The topic this year is Health Care Communications Strategy: Boomers, Xers and Nexters…Communicating in a Cross-Generational/Cross-Cultural Landscape. The day began with a talk by Jane Brody, the “holy grail” of health columnists. She started off by talking about how we as PR communicators are vital to the health of the nation. I must say, it was nice of someone to notice.

Among her topics she talked about the need for compliance—the “holy grail” of pharma execs everywhere—and how we need to do a better job communicating why consumers should stay on treatment. It was the one message about how to lower our country’s healthcare costs that may be palatable to conservative industry colleagues. (more…)

So what is Vytorin’s story exactly? Industry watchers say they are still searching for answers, but expect docs to move away from prescribing the drug. Filling in the blanks is the familiar debate over Vytorin’s cost/benefit ratio and the question: Does new necessarily mean better? (more…)