Physicians Treating Alzheimer’s Disease Patients Should Be Aware that Televised Direct-to-Consumer Advertising Links More Strongly to Drug Utilization in Older Patients

Who are the opinion leaders? The physicians, pharmacists, patients, and direct-to-consumer prescription drug advertising.

A popular perception holds that physicians prescribe requested drugs to patients influenced by mass mediated direct-to-consumer prescription drug advertising. The phenomenon poses a serious challenge to the two-step flow model, which emphasizes the influence of opinion leaders on their followers and their legitimating power over the informing power of the mass media. This study investigates a 2...

Effects of Direct-to-consumer Drug Advertising

Direct-to-consumer prescription drug advertising.

Trade Agreements and Direct-to-Consumer Advertising of Pharmaceuticals

There is growing international concern about the risks posed by direct-to-consumer advertising (DTCA) of prescription pharmaceuticals, including via the internet. Recent trade agreements negotiated by the United States, however, incorporate provisions that may constrain national regulation of DTCA. Some provisions explicitly mention DTCA; others enable foreign investors to seek compensation if ...

Direct-to-consumer advertising: should there be a free market in healthcare information?

On June 3, 2003, the European Council of health ministers rejected a proposal from the European Commission to allow drug manufacturers to advertise directly to particular groups of patients; the proposal had already been rejected by the European Parliament subsequent to a heated public debate in which consumer and patient groups almost unanimously argued that it was not the role of drug compani...