Healthy Skepticism Library item: 20106

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

Jenkins R
Doctors unmoved by online drug ads
Australian Doctor 2006 Jun 165
http://www.australiandoctor.com.au/news/latest-news/doctors-unmoved-by-online-drug-ads

Full text:

GPs are not influenced by pharmaceutical advertisements embedded in clinical software, latest Australian data suggest.

Contrary to widespread belief, researchers found the prescribing habits of GPs exposed to these ads were no different from doctors who used ad-free software or no software.

Prescribing rates were analysed for 773 GPs who used Medical Director software the only brand with embedded ads and 484 GPs who were not exposed to the ads.

Prescriptions were analysed for atorvastatin (Lipitor), telmisartan (Micardis), meloxicam (Mobic), esomeprazole (Nexium), amlodipine (Norvasc) and lercanidipine (Zanidip) because they were advertised on Medical Director software for the period of the 18-month study.

For six of the seven drugs, there was no significant differences in prescribing practices between the two groups.

But researchers found GPs using Medical Director software were significantly less likely than the other group to prescribe esomeprazole, suggesting a possible negative impact from the advertisements, the authors said.

The researchers, from the Family Medicine Research Centre at the University of Sydney, analysed data from the Bettering the Evaluation and Care of Health (BEACH) program.

Senior research officer Ms Joan Henderson said the research answered questions about the influence of embedded advertisement “to a degree”.

“There’s still potential influence on patients to be considered,” she said.

Dr Ken Harvey, honorary research fellow at Melbourne’s La Trobe University and a long-time critic of pharmaceutical advertising, said it was a “wonderful result”

“They have shown that it doesn’t seem to influence behaviour – since it clearly annoys a lot of doctors and costs the industry, it seems an excellent reason to get rid of it,” he said.

AMA ethics and medico-legal committee chairwoman Dr Rosanna Capolingua said the ads should be banned because they invaded the doctor-patient relationship.

Responding to the findings, a Medicines Australia spokesman said it relied “on doctors to make appropriate prescribing decisions, based on their years of training, strong ethics and professionalism, and concern for patients”