So I opened a huge envelope that arrived recently, and found that the loudly proclaimed “OFFER INSIDE”: it’s for a combination asthma inhaler (the kind that comes with a steroid and a long-acting bronchodilator). “Because you asked about treatments for asthma”… except I did not.
How the hell did they get my contact information? To the best of my knowledge I have never signed up for any communications with Glaxo-Smith-Kline-Beecham-Addinafewmorenameshere. I do use inhalers (my steroid is actually a GSK product) but there has, to the best of my knowledge, never been any admissable reason for my name to have been passed on to them. HIPAA violation somewhere maybe, and if so how might I try to track it down?
This is going too damn far. They are spending money that could be used to, yanno, reduce medication costs, to drive up demand for a much more expensive medication that is necessary for the health of their bottom line, not for the patients’ wellbeing.
Well I have to back off on the HIPAA concerns; I just called to get them to stop sending crap, and the email address they had for me was one I don’t give out except for marketing purposes - so clearly I signed up for some kind of information years ago.
I still think it’s scummy to try to sell direct to patients. I suspect that part of the deal here is the steroid that is a component of the combo inhaler must be getting ready to go generic, and they’re trying to prop up their profits.
Are insurance companies allowed to do stuff with the information they get? I’ve gotten a few things relating to asthma for my daughter, but she’s never been diagnosed with asthma. I’ve gotten a few things over the years as well, and I know I never sign up for anything. I don’t give my email to anyone that I don’t absolutely have to, and that includes the doctor.
I do know the insurance companies have nurses that will call and ask if you have any questions about new medications, they’ve done so for me a few times a day or so after I’ve gotten new meds, that pisses me off too.
I get that kind of stuff too (but information arthritis treatments), and the stupid insurance-hired nurses calling and emailing me. I hang up on them. I work with my doctors and don’t need any busybodies sticking their noses into my business, thankyouverymuch. They also snailmail me a silly “health log” where I can jot down my vital statistics periodically. I throw that away, too.
You can use the same concept you do for emails when giving out your information for snail mail. Use a different name, so you’ll then know where the stuff is coming from.
I stumbled on this accidentally in the past. My name starts with a T (big surprise). But I used sign it in a way that some people thought looked like an L. Also, at some point, I accidentally checked the Jr box, and get mail for BigT Lastname Jr.
That’s how I know the current set of magazines that keep getting shipped to me from various sources (sports, health, etc) are not something I actually signed up for. They’re from over a decade ago.
The latest thing I’m seeing advertised? Repatha, for extremely high LDL cholesterol.
It’s really only for people with homozygous familial hypercholesterolemia (if you don’t know what that is, you don’t have to worry about it) and is a monoclonal antibody.
C’mon. Do they really think doctors who work with a lipid clinic don’t know about this?
I may not be a Dr, but do I have to be one to think this kind of marketing (and even the “You Need This Drug” TV ads) are way beyond the pale, promote hypochondria to some extent,
and are bad for the public, bad for doctors, and bad for the country in general?
As alluded to above, there’s a reason why most other Western countries place extreme restrictions on DtC marketing of prescription drugs. For example, here in Canada it’s illegal for DtC marketing for a drug to state or imply what the drug is used to treat. It’s always very jarring for me to watch a US TV channel and be absolutely bombarded by drug ads.
No, and I agree with you. There’s no need, beyond brand recognition, for DTC marketing and tv/magazine ads to still exist.
I don’t understand why we can remove cigarette ads from TV but not DTC pharma marketing.
If anything, the DTC advertising scares me away from the advertised drug. All of them have a long list of potential side effects that are recited in the ad, and some even warn you they may be fatal!
I don’t have a problem with drug companies running ads about various medical conditions, to promote awareness of them and that it’s a good idea to be screened for them if there’s a chance you may have them. But advertising drugs to treat them, especially if it’s for a rare condition? Nope.
One thing that really bothers me are the drugs for “mild to moderate Alzheimer’s” and they show Mom or Dad neatly dressed and coiffed and/or shaved, eating off a plate with utensils. By the time the person reaches the “moderate” stage, that ship has already sailed and fallen off the edge of the earth.
The law says that pharmaceutical ads can’t say what the medicine is good for unless the ad also tells you all of the side effects. So they have two options: They can make an ad that’s silent about the side effects and only very vaguely (if at all) hints at what it does, or they can make an ad that just comes right out and says it, and also lists the “slight chance of death or dismemberment”. You’ll see ads using both strategies. The pendulum lately seems to have swung more towards the tell-all ads, but it wasn’t too long ago that the typical pharmaceutical ad showed a dude windsurfing on a field of wheat and telling you “Ask your doctor about Allegra”.
