Pharmacoeconomics
terrasig | May 15, 2009Well, it's mid-May at 36° North, the honeysuckles are blooming, my allergies are miserable, the air is damp, and that can only mean one thing: the American Society for Clinical Oncology (ASCO) meeting is nearly upon us.
Held this year beginning on 29 May, the annual ASCO meeting coincides with all sorts of announcements of miracle cancer drugs and the sound of cash changing hands. Although being held in Orlando, Florida, this is far from a Mickey Mouse operation; in fact, the buzz of bullion here rivals that of the Walt Disney empire. With the abstracts released last night at 6 pm EDT,…
terrasig | February 9, 2009I know that many of you have seen this article by Matthew Perronne since it was picked up by the majority of AP outlets this morning:
Two drugmakers spent hundreds of millions of dollars last year to raise awareness of a murky illness, helping boost sales of pills recently approved as treatments and drowning out unresolved questions -- including whether it's a real disease at all.
Key components of the industry-funded buzz over the pain-and-fatigue ailment fibromyalgia are grants -- more than $6 million donated by drugmakers Eli Lilly and Pfizer in the first three quarters of 2008 -- to…
terrasig | June 4, 2008This whole "cosmeceutical" thing probably shouldn't be in "Medicine & Health" but we did call your attention to today's news item back on 27 July 2007: Drug maker Allergan announced at a stock analyst's meeting this afternoon that it is filing a New Drug Application (NDA) for a cosmetic form of its anti-glaucoma drug bimatoprost (Lumigan®) as a result of it side effect in increasing the number and thickness of eyelashes.
Allergan (nyse: AGN) has completed its clinical trial program demonstrating that its patented formulation of bimatoprost, when applied directly to the base of the…
terrasig | December 8, 2007We've been speaking about this issue on behalf of our lymphoma colleagues since late August.
But yesterday's New York Times (Alex Berenson) and Wall Street Journal's Health Blog (Jacob Goldstein) brought greater awareness to the issue of Medicare's proposal to cut reimbursement for "smart-bomb" radioimmunotherapies for lymphomas. So far, it appears that Medicare will move forward with plans to cut reimbursements for two RIT drugs, Bexxar® and Zevalin®, to less than their acquisition costs to hospitals.
This issue had already mobilized Newsweek's Jonathan Alter to write a piercing screed…
terrasig | November 27, 2007Compounds in grapefruit juice inhibits an enzyme required for metabolism of nearly half of prescription drugs on the market. If you inhibit drug metabolism, would that allow you to take a lower (and cheaper) dose of one of those drugs, especially an expensive drug?
That is the proposition of a company called Bioavailability Systems, featured in today's Wall Street Journal and alluded to on the WSJ Health Blog (yes, I cite the WSJ very often but only because they have some of the best medical and health reporting on topics well ahead of the MSM curve).
The intestines and the liver contain…
terrasig | November 25, 2007As I sat to write a post this morning, I became more engaged in a story in the New York Times magazine by Dr Daniel Carlat entitled, "Dr. Drug Rep." Joseph of Corpus Callosum recently commented here about being solicited to recommend fellow physicians in the local area and nationally who he perceived as "thought leaders" in his specialty.
Carlat was such a physician who was cultivated by Wyeth to discuss their antidepressant, Effexor XR, to fellow physicians at conferences and in doctors' offices. His piece in the NYT magazine chronicles his development by Wyeth as a drug spokesperson and…
terrasig | November 11, 2007The travesty has come true, according to Karl Schwartz and Betsy de Parry of Patients Against Lymphoma.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has gone ahead with their plans to slash by half reimbursements to hospitals for two radioimmunotherapy drugs. For many hospital, reimbursement rates will be lower than their acquisition costs. We discussed this possibility back in August but had thought that CMS administrators would acknowledge the outcry from the lymphoma survivor/advocacy community, not to mention very strong statements from ASCO (American Society of Clinical…
terrasig | October 24, 2007We wrote a few days ago on the disappointing discontinuation of Pfizer's Exubera, the first inhaled insulin product.
The always-insightful Dr Derek Lowe at In the Pipeline has an excellent commentary on this case, including his own take on the futility of putting lipstick on a pig:
1. Marketing isn't everything. The next time someone tells you about how drug companies can sell junk that people don't need through their powerful, money-laden sales force, spare a thought for Pfizer. The biggest drug company in the world, with the biggest sales force and the biggest cash reserves, couldn't move…
terrasig | October 18, 2007Scott Hensley at the WSJ.com Health Blog had a banner day today with the sad withdrawal by Pfizer of their inhaled insulin product, Exubera. When I was a pharmacy professor in the mid-1990s, we shared Pharma's optimism that an inhaled insulin product would be a godsend for diabetes patients who had to inject themselves with this essential hormone. The Terra Sig blog also has a historical soft spot for insulin since it was first crystallized by our nom-sake, Prof John Jacob Abel (PNAS 1926; 12:132-6 - PDF here).
Well, Abel must be quite disappointed somewhere out there in the Great Beyond:…
terrasig | September 22, 2007The Pump Handle's Liz Borowski put up a nice post summarizing the key points of the >400-page Food and Drug Administration Amendments Act of 2007 (H.R. 3580).
Missing from the bill were any further restrictions on pharmaceutical direct-to-consumer (DTC) drug advertising - according to Liz, some drug safety advocates were calling for a complete ban on DTC ads.
Since the FDA began permitting DTC advertising in 1997, the purpose of the ads has been viewed as less about patient education for underdiagnosed diseases (the original pitch) and more about getting patients to request specific…
terrasig | September 14, 2007[Welcome Daily Kos readers and many thanks to DarkSyde for the link - btw, if you're wondering what Terra Sigillata is, click here.]
The other day I fired off a quick post on the absurdity of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) is proposing to cut reimbursements for two radioimmunotherapy drugs for lymphoma to less than their cost. The two immunotherapy drugs in question are Bexxar (I-131 tositumomab) and Zevalin (Y-90 ibritumomab) - both drugs target the CD20 protein on the surface of normal and malignant B-lymphocytes, killing the cells by the radioactive emissions of…
terrasig | August 30, 2007Karl Schwartz is a tireless lymphoma patient advocate who is co-founder and president of Patients Against Lymphoma. Karl also oversees their excellent website, Lymphomation.org.
A missive from Karl came in today detailing how the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) is proposing to cut reimbursements for two radioimmunotherapy drugs to less than their cost. Their collective response to the Deputy Administrator of CMS can be viewed in PDF or HTML.
The two immunotherapy drugs in question are Bexxar (I-131 tositumomab) and Zevalin (Y-90 ibritumomab). They are among the most…
terrasig | March 16, 2007This week has seen the launch of a new health blog by the Wall Street Journal. While I don't hold the highly conservative views of the WSJ editorial pages, I have found the paper one of the best international sources of information on health trends in both conventional and alternative medicine. The only problem about the blog is that while it links to the day's health news, the original articles are still firewalled behind the subscription.
But I do wish to note Jacob Goldstein's post on an article by Geeta Anand about Dr Steven Harr. Harr is a Hopkins-trained doc-turned-stock analyst who…