Did Big Pharma team up to kill British Columbia's drug safety watchdog?
Was the provincial government pressured by deep-pocketed pharmaceutical conglomerates to kill off the Therapeutics Initiative, an internationally acclaimed drug watchdog agency run out of UBC?That theory may sound like an outlandish plot from a Hollywood movie, but it gained some credibility during this spring’s provincial election when it was raised by NDP leader Adrian Dix.He said the “influential” pharmaceutical industry, which donates to and lobbies the B.C. Liberals, incessantly pressured the government to shut down the Therapeutics Initiative (TI).The TI is a small agency of university scientists who study the ...
Source: PharmaGossip - July 13, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: insider Source Type: blogs
Castellani vs Goldacre
Are clinical trial data shared sufficiently today? YesThe AllTrials campaign asks for all trials to be registered and their results published. Ben Goldacre (doi:10.1136/bmj.f1880) says we need the evidence to make informed decisions about medicines. John Castellani says mandatory disclosure could affect patient privacy, stifle discovery, and allow competitors or unscrupulous actors to use the informationClinical trials are essential for the successful development of new medicines that save and improve lives and provide hope for millions of patients. Biopharmaceutical companies are committed to the conti...
Source: PharmaGossip - July 9, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: insider Source Type: blogs
Tamiflu saga continues - NYT. By Katie Thomas
Breaking the Seal on Drug ResearchPETER DOSHI walked across the campus of Johns Hopkins University in a rumpled polo shirt and stonewashed jeans, a backpack slung over one shoulder. An unremarkable presence on a campus filled with backpack-toters, he is 32, and not sure where he’ll be working come August, when his postdoctoral fellowship ends. And yet, even without a medical degree, he is one of the most influential voices in medical research today.Dr. Doshi’s renown comes not from solving the puzzles of cancer or discovering the next blockbuster drug, but from pushing the world’s biggest pharmaceutical companie...
Source: PharmaGossip - June 30, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: insider Source Type: blogs
NJIT Researcher Develops New Algorithm Cluster To Data Mine Health Records
“Large collections of electronic patient records have long provided abundant, but under-explored information on the real-world use of medicines. But when used properly these records can provide longitudinal observational data which is perfect for data mining,” Duan said. “Although such records are maintained for patient administration, they could provide a broad range of clinical information for data analysis. A growing interest has been drug safety.”
In this paper, the researchers proposed two novel algorithms—a likelihood ratio model and a Bayesian network model—for adverse drug effect discovery. Although th...
Source: FutureHIT - Speculations on the Future of Health IT - June 9, 2013 Category: Technology Consultants Authors: Hunscher Source Type: blogs
Merck Loses Battle Over Outsourced Vioxx Lawsuit In Kentucky
In a setback to Merck, a federal court judge has tossed a lawsuit in which the drugmaker charged the Kentucky Attorney General had violated its constitutional due process rights for using a contingency fee arrangement with outside lawyers to help pursue litigation over the marketing of the Vioxx painkiller (back story and lawsuit).
The two-year-old case had been closely watched because the outcome held the potential for complicating efforts by other states that have retained law firms to help prosecute drugmakers for violating consumer protection laws and Medicaid fraud. Merck (MRK) had hoped for a favorable ruling that wo...
Source: Pharmalot - May 29, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: esilverman Source Type: blogs
Oz Court rejects Merck deal over Vioxx
A Federal Court judge has refused drug company Merck's $540,000 settlement with Australians who claim its drug Vioxx caused them a heart attack, labelling the deal an "obvious injustice".More than 1700 people joined a class action against the Australian arm of the international pharmaceutical company, claiming their heart trouble stemmed from taking its arthritis drug.The parties reached a $540,000 settlement last month, subject to Federal Court approval, which would have resulted in the proceedings being dismissed and the matter finalised, meaning no future claims could have been brought against Merck over the drug.Justic...
Source: PharmaGossip - May 17, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: insider Source Type: blogs
Ken Frazier at Merck: An Assessment
Here's a fine profile of Merck's Ken Frazier at Forbes. Matthew Herper does a good job of showing the hole that Merck has been slowly sliding into over the past few years, and wonders if Frazier is going to be able to drag the company out of it:
But it is clear that Frazier still views himself through the prism of his lawyerly training–he has not yet grown into a commanding and decisive chief executive. He’s scrupulous about not making anyone else look bad–working almost too hard in interviews to be clear that Perlmutter’s predecessor was not fired–and seems to be afraid to be seen as making too many big changes...
Source: In the Pipeline - May 6, 2013 Category: Chemists Tags: Business and Markets Source Type: blogs
Planting drug industry-funded papers in medical journals
Where did the medical community get the idea that Vioxx, Trovan and Baycol were safe and the benefits of Prempro, Neurontin and bisphosphonates outweighed their risks? From research published in medical journals written by drug companies or drug-company funded authors.
Continue reading ...
Your patients are rating you online: How to respond. Manage your online reputation: A social media guide. Find out how. (Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog)
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - April 29, 2013 Category: Family Physicians Tags: Meds Cancer Medications Source Type: blogs
Judge queries fairness of Oz Vioxx settlement
AAP
Drug company Merck has reached a $500,000 settlement with those who claim the company's arthritis drug Vioxx caused heart problems, but a judge is questioning the fairness of the deal.
More than 1700 group members represented by law firm Slater and Gordon had joined an application against the Australian arm of the international pharmaceutical company over claims its arthritis drug Vioxx caused them heart problems.
Federal Court Justice Christopher Jessup, who must approve of the settlement which will be binding on all group members, on Wednesday said he was concerned about its fairness.
It would result in the proce...
Source: PharmaGossip - April 17, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: insider Source Type: blogs
Drug companies pay UK doctors £40m for travel and expenses | Society | The Guardian
Drug companies are paying an estimated £40m a year to British doctors in service fees, flights, hotel and other travel expenses, according to the trade body that represents pharmaceutical companies.The Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI) said that most of the 44 biggest companies had now revealed how much they paid doctors to help market their drugs. Its aggregated total of £40m is based on 35 suppliers who have shared precise information with the body and estimates for the rest.The largest British group, GlaxoSmithKline, spent £1.9m on fees for advice and consultancy on 1,517 UK-based doctors, an ...
Source: PharmaGossip - April 5, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: insider Source Type: blogs
Pharmalot… Pharmalittle… Good Morning
Hello, everyone, and nice to see you again. We hope the weekend was refreshing and invigorating. Now, though, deadlines and meetings are looming once more. This was predictable, of course, so time to reach for a cup of stimulation to jumpstart the neurons, for better or worse. Please join us. We prefer not to drink alone this morning. Meanwhile, here are some tidbits to get you started, since there is much to do. Hope your day goes well and drop us a line if you run across something unusual or simply fascinating…
CVS Pays $650K For Dispending Incorrect Pills (NJ Star-Ledger)
Royalty Pharma Offers $6.5 Billion For Ela...
Source: Pharmalot - February 25, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: Ed Silverman Tags: Uncategorized Affymax Allergan Anemdia Breast Cancer CEO Pay CVS Dan Vasella Elan EMA FDA JJ Johnson & Johnson Merck Merck KgGA Novartis Omontys Pediatric Vaccines QualiCaps Roche Royalty Pharma Sanofi Takeda Ph Source Type: blogs
Is Evidence-Based Medicine Only an Illusion?
By Kristina Fiore, Staff Writer, MedPage Today
Published: February 23, 2013
In a system where half of all clinical trials never see the light of publication, doctors are merely "imagining that we're practicing evidence-based medicine," says Ben Goldacre, MBBS, a British physician and science journalist.
Goldacre is among the most vocal critics of drugmakers who refuse to hand over complete clinical trial data, making it impossible for doctors and patients to get the full picture on most of the medicines widely used today. He decries the industry's behavior in his new book, Bad Pharma, which in itself is a review of the e...
Source: PharmaGossip - February 24, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: insider Source Type: blogs
Tell it like it is
Ghostwritten medical articles called fraud
It's fraudulent for academics to give their names to medical articles ghostwritten by pharmaceutical industry writers, say two Canadian law professors who call for potential legal sanctions.
Studies suggest that industry-driven drug trials and industry-sponsored publications are more likely to downplay a drug's harms and exaggerate a drug's virtues, said Trudo Lemmens, a law professor at the University of Toronto. The integrity of medical research is also harmed by ghostwritten articles, he said.
'False representation of authorship is in our view fraud.'— Trudo Lemmens
Ghostw...
Source: PharmaGossip - February 19, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: insider Source Type: blogs
Avandia - Glaxo resists UK claims despite settlement with victims in US
Families face battle with GSK over dangerous diabetes drug
Tuesday 29 January 2013 21.04 GMT
Sarah Boseley, health editor
Thousands of families in the UK could be deprived of compensation for the death or harm of a relative caused by the diabetes drug Avandia, even though the British maker has agreed to pay billions of dollars to settle similar claims in the US.
The licence for Avandia was revoked in Europe, in September 2010, because of evidence that it could cause heart failure and heart attacks. The drug can still be prescribed in the US, but not to patients at risk of heart problems.
A scientist with the Food and ...
Source: PharmaGossip - February 11, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: insider Source Type: blogs
New York Mayor Bloomberg: Gun Control - Yes, Bad Health IT Control - No?
The Mayor of New York, Bloomberg, calls for anti-gun legislation because accidents and unexpected events such as theft or use by a child can happen, even with legally owned guns (I don't think he believes law-abiding citizens who own them for defense or for sport would break the law with them).Yet the selfsame Mayor uncritically calls for spread of another technology that in its present state is prone to accidents and unintended consequences, and unlike guns, at a level that even the Institute of Medicine has admitted in unknown due to systematic impediments to transparency (see the middle of this post for source).From a r...
Source: Health Care Renewal - February 8, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Tags: gun control Mayor Bloomberg healthcare IT risks healthcare IT benefits Source Type: blogs
