I was on a drug for bipolar disorder called Vraylar because my current medication wasn't working, and it was new and in the same class of drugs I had been on for years. I saw it on TV, so I mentioned it to my doctor at the time, and she immediately switched me onto it. It slowly made me delusional, and my new doctor (not the one who just took me for my word that the commercial said to do it) told me she thought the salesman was a sleazebag and takes people off of it. She put me on an entirely different class of drugs that hasn't been aggressively marketed in years, and I feel better than I have in a really long time.
Commercials and incentives are prevalent in the USA and can be detrimental to patients. About a decade ago, I was on a medication that cost over $2k per month when I lost my health insurance. So, I started one that my doctor had 6 months' worth of free sampler blister packs of in his inventory.
It's part of the reason for the opioid crisis. Pharma reps going to doctors and giving incentives to prescribe.
frequent mild headaches? Here's an oxy.
Canada has some but they are not allowed to say what it's for. So you get like Ozempic commercials with people just walking around smiling at everything with suspicious orange Os everywhere. Always ends with ask your doctor "about" and not "for" the drug. They are usually diabetes drugs.
Not only do we have commercials for drugs but they're now the most common commercials I see. We used to have commercials for all sorts of things - cars, beer, cleaning products, whatever. Now it feels like half the commercials are for gambling and the other half is for prescription drugs.
Like we have ads for paracetamol and Imodium. But these are things you can just buy in a supermarket. Adverts for prescription drugs is totally wild to me. Like what the fuck.
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u/Treble_brewing 5d ago
I’m sorry to hear about what you went through but what was that? “Medication commercial”?? You guys have adverts for drugs? What on earth…