Healthy Skepticism Library item: 19148

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: Journal Article

Brody H, Light DW
The Inverse Benefit Law: How Drug Marketing Undermines Patient Safety and Public Health.
Am J Public Health 2011 Jan 13;
http://ajph.aphapublications.org/cgi/content/short/AJPH.2010.199844v1

Abstract:

Recent highly publicized withdrawals
of drugs from the market because of
safety concerns raise the question
of whether these events are random
failures or part of a recurring
pattern. The inverse benefit law,
inspired by Hart’s inverse care law,
states that the ratio of benefits to
harms among patients taking new
drugs tends to vary inversely with
how extensively the drugs are
marketed. The law is manifested
through 6 basic marketing
strategies: reducing thresholds for
diagnosing disease, relying on
surrogate endpoints, exaggerating
safety claims, exaggerating efficacy
claims, creating new diseases, and
encouraging unapproved uses. The
inverse benefit law highlights the
need for comparative effectiveness
research and other reforms to
improve evidence-based prescribing.