December 2000 • Volume 6 Number 12
Stop direct-to-consumer TV ads
To the editor:
We physicians have a problem which is steadily growing -- prescription medication advertisements to the public on various TV networks.
While attending the AAFP convention in Dallas, I learned the FDA gave its approval of this practice. To change this approval would require considerable difficulties, such as obtaining a congressional mandate.
Besides the inconveniences to us as physicians that the patients ask for particular drugs, perhaps the most serious consequence is the added cost of medications due to expensive commercials. Most patients complain about the high price of prescriptions, which leads many to make periodic trips to Mexico to buy their medicines -- medicines made by the same companies but at a considerable reduction in price.
Having worked for a large pharmaceutical company in the past, I offer a simple solution to this growing practice. We should simply refuse to see the company's representatives ("detail men") until they stop this growing tendency (toward direct-to-consumer TV ads). We owe this to our patients, who are unaware of the negative effects of this menace.
John F. Smyth, M.D.
Mexico City
FP Report is published by the AAFP News Department.
Copyright © 2000 by American Academy of Family Physicians.
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