Healthy Skepticism Library item: 6562

Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.

Publication type: book

Moore TJ.
Deadly medicine: why tens of thousands of heart patients died in America’s worst drug disaster
New York: Simon & Shuster 1995

Keywords:
*analysis/United States/3M/Bristol Myers/Tambocor/Mexetil/conference speakers/journal advertisements/quality of information/FDA/Food and Drug Administration/promotion costs and volume/ sponsored symposia & conferences/gift giving/sales representatives/seeding studies/drug company sponsored research/ reimbursement to doctors/ETHICAL ISSUES IN PROMOTION: GIFT GIVING/ETHICAL ISSUES IN PROMOTION: LINKS BETWEEN HEALTH PROFESSIONALS AND INDUSTRY/ETHICAL ISSUES IN PROMOTION: PAYMENT FOR MEALS, ACCOMODATION, TRAVEL, ENTERTAINMENT/ETHICAL ISSUES IN PROMOTION: PAYMENTS IN STUDIES/EVALUATION OF PROMOTION: DETAILING/PROMOTION DISGUISED: APPOINTMENTS AND RETAINERS/PROMOTION DISGUISED: CLINICAL TRIALS/PROMOTION DISGUISED: COMPANY SPONSORED SPEAKING TOURS AND CONFERENCE SPEAKERS/REGULATION, CODES, GUIDELINES: DIRECT GOVERNMENT REGULATION/VOLUME OF AND EXPENDITURE ON PROMOTION

Notes:

Deadly Medicine is a human story about the brilliant and driven doctors who worked on Tambocor and similar heart drugs-at pharmaceutical companies, within the FDA, and at university medical research centers. It provides a vivid and disturbing account of the system by which drugs are discovered, tested, and marketed to doctors. Through the tragic story of how tens of thousands of patients died prematurely from one class of heart drugs, Deadly Medicine also exposes major flaws in this system.

Chapter 16 (pp. 163-176) first describes the typical promotional practices of drug companies: gift giving, sales representatives, paying doctors large sums to participate in studies of dubious value and buying prescribing data of physicians details. The chapter then goes on to describe how 3M and Bristol Myers, makers of the heart drugs Tambocor and Mexetil, employed leading American cardiologists to lecture about their products at symposia. It also presents critical evaluations of journal advertisements for Tambocor and the reaction of the Food and Drug Administration to these ads.