Healthy Skepticism Library item: 20079

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: Magazine

Sweeney C
Expert calls for advertising ban on prescribing software
Australian Doctor 2004 Sep 35
http://www.australiandoctor.com.au/news/latest-news/expert-calls-for-advertising-ban-on-prescribing-so

Full text:

Drug companies should be banned from exposing doctors to advertisements via medical software, according to a senior academic.

Dr Ken Harvey, a senior lecturer in public health at La Trobe University, called on the Federal Government to “get promotion out of computerised prescribing” by introducing national standards for prescribing software that prevent drug companies from promoting drugs on doctors desktops.

Dr Harvey, speaking at the Future of the PBS conference in Sydney last week, said by leaving prescribing software in the hands of market forces, the government had failed to contain the cost of the PBS and had put consumers at risk.

Later Dr Harvey, who has studied the impact of marketing on prescribing habits for many years, told
Australian Doctor the governance of prescribing software fell “into limbo”

“We’ve come from a cottage industry, a couple of GPs writing their software, to something the government has actually encouraged to be on every doctor’s desktop, and there’s no standards,” he said.

However, Dr Andrew Magennis, chief medical officer at Health Communication Network, the makers of Medical Director – which is used by about 85% of GPs – said some advertising on the software provided useful information about more cost-effective medications.

“The advertising… is not an evil thing twisting the minds of GPs to go against what’s best for their patients,” Dr Magennis said.

Ads appear on doctors’ screens after they hit the print button for a script and remain visible for about five seconds.

Dr Magennis said the ads did not deliberately target the condition for which a script had been written, although the company had been asked by pharmaceutical companies to do this.

“I as a clinician find that repulsive and it’s not the way our company wants to go,” he said.

While doctors can buy ad-free software from other providers, Dr Magennis said there was insufficient demand to justify offering an ad-free version of Medical Director.

Dr Ron Tomlins, chairman of the General Practice Computing Group, said there was no evidence that ads on prescribing software influenced GPs.

“I think it’s a question that probably does deserve proper consideration,” Dr Tomlins said.

But the practical reality is that the business model of the software developer with the major share of the market relies on the support of the pharmaceutical industry.