Download or read book Making Medicines Affordable written by National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2018-03-01 with total page 235 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Thanks to remarkable advances in modern health care attributable to science, engineering, and medicine, it is now possible to cure or manage illnesses that were long deemed untreatable. At the same time, however, the United States is facing the vexing challenge of a seemingly uncontrolled rise in the cost of health care. Total medical expenditures are rapidly approaching 20 percent of the gross domestic product and are crowding out other priorities of national importance. The use of increasingly expensive prescription drugs is a significant part of this problem, making the cost of biopharmaceuticals a serious national concern with broad political implications. Especially with the highly visible and very large price increases for prescription drugs that have occurred in recent years, finding a way to make prescription medicinesâ€"and health care at largeâ€"more affordable for everyone has become a socioeconomic imperative. Affordability is a complex function of factors, including not just the prices of the drugs themselves, but also the details of an individual's insurance coverage and the number of medical conditions that an individual or family confronts. Therefore, any solution to the affordability issue will require considering all of these factors together. The current high and increasing costs of prescription drugsâ€"coupled with the broader trends in overall health care costsâ€"is unsustainable to society as a whole. Making Medicines Affordable examines patient access to affordable and effective therapies, with emphasis on drug pricing, inflation in the cost of drugs, and insurance design. This report explores structural and policy factors influencing drug pricing, drug access programs, the emerging role of comparative effectiveness assessments in payment policies, changing finances of medical practice with regard to drug costs and reimbursement, and measures to prevent drug shortages and foster continued innovation in drug development. It makes recommendations for policy actions that could address drug price trends, improve patient access to affordable and effective treatments, and encourage innovations that address significant needs in health care.

Download or read book Some Antiviral and Antineoplastic Drugs and Other Pharmaceutical Agents written by IARC Working Group on the Evaluation of Carcinogenic Risks to Humans and published by World Health Organization. This book was released on 2000 with total page 536 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Evaluates the carcinogenic risks to humans posed by the use of four antiretroviral agents four DNA topoisomerase II inhibitors used in the treatment of cancer and an additional three pharmaceutical agents (hydroxyures phenolphthalein and vitamin K substances). The volume marks the first IARC evaluation of nucleoside analogs that act as antiviral agents. The evaluation responds in part to recent findings that zidovudine (AZT) an effective antiretroviral agent now being given to pregnant HIV-infected women to prevent maternal-to-fetal transmission of the virus is a transplacental carcinogen in mice. The opening monograph evaluates the carcinogenicity to humans of the antiretroviral nucleoside analogs zidovudine (AZT) zalcitabine (ddC) and didanosine (ddI) and the antiherpesvirus drug aciclovir. Of these aciclovir and didanosine could not be classified on the basis of available data. For zidovudine transplacental administration to mice resulted in an increased incidence and multiplicity of lung and liver tumours and in an increased incidence of female reproductive tract tumours in one study but not in another involving treatment at a lower dose. Despite observation of toxic effects in some studies of humans human carcinogenicity data were judged to provide inadequate evidence of carcinogenicity in humans. Zidovudine was classified as possibly carcinogenic to humans. Similar weaknesses in human carcinogenicity data for zalcitabine which consistently induces thymic lymphomas in mice resulted in its classification as possibly carcinogenic to humans. The second monograph evaluates four DNA topoisomerase II inhibitors: etoposide teniposide mitoxantrone and amsacrine. Of these etoposide - one of the most widely used and effective cytotoxic drugs in combination therapy - was classified as probably carcinogenic to humans and etoposide in combination with cisplatin and bleomycin was judged to be carcinogenic to humans. Teniposide was classified as probably carcinogenic to humans and mitoxantrone and amsacrine were classified as possibly carcinogenic to humans. Of the three pharmaceutical agents evaluated in the final monograph hydroxyurea which is widely used in cancer treatment and increasingly in combination with didanosine in HIV infection could not be classified. Phenolphthalein a widely used laxative now being withdrawn from the market in many countries because of toxicological concerns was classified as possibly carcinogenic. Vitamin K substances could not be classified on the basis of available evidence.

Download or read book Pills Potions and Poisons written by T. W. Stone and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2004 with total page 476 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: About half of all the medicines prescribed by doctors are not taken by their patients. One of the reasons most commonly given by patients for not taking drugs is that they feel unhappy about taking medicines which they do not understand and of which they are afraid. This book attempts to rectify this problem by showing in clear, non-technical language how medicines and other drugs work in the body to reduce the effects of disease. Most chapters include fascinating background information on how some of our most important drugs were discovered, along with intriguing and often amusing anecdotes about the drugs and the people behind their discovery. Each chapter also includes a summary of the key points together with illustrations, photographs or diagrams to summarise the main groups and how they work in the body. The book covers all the major groups of drugs, with complete listings of all the drugs available in the UK and the USA, so that the reader can locate his or her specific drug and read about the actions of the drugs in that group. The various chapters cover drugs used to treat high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes, nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, constipation, ulcers, cancers, infections, impotence, incontinence, arthritis, osteoporosis, as well as hormone replacement therapy, oral contraceptives and drugs used in disorders of the brain such as schizophrenia, depression, Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease and epilepsy. There is also a chapter on drugs which are abused such as cannabis, alcohol, nicotine and ecstasy, and a chapter covering some of the poisons we encounter, such as carbon monoxide, arsenic, sheep dip, and the venoms of snakes, spiders, scorpions and marine organisms. Here, then, a fascinating survey of how chemicals have their effects in the body. It shows how drugs work and explains why it is that taking some medicines for many years is far safer than suffering the long-term effects of disease. Pills, Potions and Poisons is an entertaining read that should also help to improve your health and quality of life.

Download or read book The Risks of Prescription Drugs written by Donald Light and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2010 with total page 179 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Few people realize that prescription drugs have become a leading cause of death, disease, and disability. Adverse reactions to widely used drugs, such as psychotropics and birth control pills, as well as biologicals, result in FDA warnings against adverse reactions. The Risks of Prescription Drugs describes how most drugs approved by the FDA are under-tested for adverse drug reactions, yet offer few new benefits. Drugs cause more than 2.2 million hospitalizations and 110,000 hospital-based deaths a year. Serious drug reactions at home or in nursing homes would significantly raise the total. Women, older people, and people with disabilities are least used in clinical trials and most affected. Health policy experts Donald Light, Howard Brody, Peter Conrad, Allan Horwitz, and Cheryl Stults describe how current regulations reward drug companies to expand clinical risks and create new diseases so millions of patients are exposed to unnecessary risks, especially women and the elderly. They reward developing marginally better drugs rather than discovering breakthrough, life-saving drugs. The Risks of Prescription Drugs tackles critical questions about the pharmaceutical industry and the privatization of risk. To what extent does the FDA protect the public from serious side effects and disasters? What is the effect of giving the private sector and markets a greater role and reducing public oversight? This volume considers whether current rules and incentives put patients' health at greater risk, the effect of the expansion of disease categories, the industry's justification of high U.S. prices, and the underlying shifts in the burden of risk borne by individuals in the world of pharmaceuticals. Chapters cover risks of statins for high cholesterol, SSRI drugs for depression and anxiety, and hormone replacement therapy for menopause. A final chapter outlines six changes to make drugs safer and more effective. Suitable for courses on health and aging, gender, disability, and minority studies, this book identifies the Risk Proliferation Syndrome that maximizes the number of people exposed to these risks. Additional Columbia / SSRC books on the privatization of risk and its implications for Americans: Bailouts: Public Money, Private ProfitEdited by Robert E. Wright Disaster and the Politics of InterventionEdited by Andrew Lakoff Health at Risk: America's Ailing Health System-and How to Heal ItEdited by Jacob S. Hacker Laid Off, Laid Low: Political and Economic Consequences of Employment InsecurityEdited by Katherine S. Newman Pensions, Social Security, and the Privatization of RiskEdited by Mitchell A. Orenstein

Download or read book Bad Pharma written by Ben Goldacre and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2013-02-05 with total page 449 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: We like to imagine that medicine is based on evidence and the results of fair testing and clinical trials. In reality, those tests and trials are often profoundly flawed. We like to imagine that doctors who write prescriptions for everything from antidepressants to cancer drugs to heart medication are familiar with the research literature about a drug, when in reality much of the research is hidden from them by drug companies. We like to imagine that doctors are impartially educated, when in reality much of their education is funded by the pharmaceutical industry. We like to imagine that regulators have some code of ethics and let only effective drugs onto the market, when in reality they approve useless drugs, with data on side effects casually withheld from doctors and patients. All these problems have been shielded from public scrutiny because they're too complex to capture in a sound bite. But Ben Goldacre shows that the true scale of this murderous disaster fully reveals itself only when the details are untangled. He believes we should all be able to understand precisely how data manipulation works and how research misconduct in the medical industry affects us on a global scale. With Goldacre's characteristic flair and a forensic attention to detail, Bad Pharma reveals a shockingly broken system and calls for regulation. This is the pharmaceutical industry as it has never been seen before.

Download or read book The Selection and Use of Essential Medicines written by WHO Expert Committee on the Selection and Use of Essential Medicines and published by WHO. This book was released on 2004 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This report presents the recommendations of the WHO Expert Committee responsible for updating the WHO Model List of Essential Medicines. The first part contains a progress report on the new procedures for updating the Model List and the development of the WHO Essential Medicines Library. It continues with a section on changes made in revising the Model List followed by a review of some sections such as hypertensive medicines and fast track procedures for deleting items. Annexes include the 13th version of the Model List and items on the list sorted according to their 5-level Anatomical Therapeutic Chemical classification codes.

Download or read book Drug Safety written by United States. General Accounting Office and published by . This book was released on 2001 with total page 12 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Bottle of Lies written by Katherine Eban and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2020-06-23 with total page 523 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * New York Times Notable Book * Best Book of the Year: New York Public Library, Kirkus Reviews, Science Friday With a new postscript by the author From an award-winning journalist, an explosive narrative investigation of the generic drug boom that reveals fraud and life-threatening dangers on a global scale—The Jungle for pharmaceuticals Many have hailed the widespread use of generic drugs as one of the most important public-health developments of the twenty-first century. Today, almost 90 percent of our pharmaceutical market is comprised of generics, the majority of which are manufactured overseas. We have been reassured by our doctors, our pharmacists and our regulators that generic drugs are identical to their brand-name counterparts, just less expensive. But is this really true? Katherine Eban’s Bottle of Lies exposes the deceit behind generic-drug manufacturing—and the attendant risks for global health. Drawing on exclusive accounts from whistleblowers and regulators, as well as thousands of pages of confidential FDA documents, Eban reveals an industry where fraud is rampant, companies routinely falsify data, and executives circumvent almost every principle of safe manufacturing to minimize cost and maximize profit, confident in their ability to fool inspectors. Meanwhile, patients unwittingly consume medicine with unpredictable and dangerous effects. The story of generic drugs is truly global. It connects middle America to China, India, sub-Saharan Africa and Brazil, and represents the ultimate litmus test of globalization: what are the risks of moving drug manufacturing offshore, and are they worth the savings? A decade-long investigation with international sweep, high-stakes brinkmanship and big money at its core, Bottle of Lies reveals how the world’s greatest public-health innovation has become one of its most astonishing swindles.

Download or read book Pain Management and the Opioid Epidemic written by National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2017-09-28 with total page 483 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Drug overdose, driven largely by overdose related to the use of opioids, is now the leading cause of unintentional injury death in the United States. The ongoing opioid crisis lies at the intersection of two public health challenges: reducing the burden of suffering from pain and containing the rising toll of the harms that can arise from the use of opioid medications. Chronic pain and opioid use disorder both represent complex human conditions affecting millions of Americans and causing untold disability and loss of function. In the context of the growing opioid problem, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) launched an Opioids Action Plan in early 2016. As part of this plan, the FDA asked the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine to convene a committee to update the state of the science on pain research, care, and education and to identify actions the FDA and others can take to respond to the opioid epidemic, with a particular focus on informing FDA's development of a formal method for incorporating individual and societal considerations into its risk-benefit framework for opioid approval and monitoring.

Download or read book Pharmaceutical Calculations written by Mitchell J. Stoklosa and published by . This book was released on 1986 with total page 428 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Truth About the Drug Companies written by Marcia Angell and published by Random House Trade Paperbacks. This book was released on 2005-08-09 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: During her two decades at The New England Journal of Medicine, Dr. Marcia Angell had a front-row seat on the appalling spectacle of the pharmaceutical industry. She watched drug companies stray from their original mission of discovering and manufacturing useful drugs and instead become vast marketing machines with unprecedented control over their own fortunes. She saw them gain nearly limitless influence over medical research, education, and how doctors do their jobs. She sympathized as the American public, particularly the elderly, struggled and increasingly failed to meet spiraling prescription drug prices. Now, in this bold, hard-hitting new book, Dr. Angell exposes the shocking truth of what the pharmaceutical industry has become–and argues for essential, long-overdue change. Currently Americans spend a staggering $200 billion each year on prescription drugs. As Dr. Angell powerfully demonstrates, claims that high drug prices are necessary to fund research and development are unfounded: The truth is that drug companies funnel the bulk of their resources into the marketing of products of dubious benefit. Meanwhile, as profits soar, the companies brazenly use their wealth and power to push their agenda through Congress, the FDA, and academic medical centers. Zeroing in on hugely successful drugs like AZT (the first drug to treat HIV/AIDS), Taxol (the best-selling cancer drug in history), and the blockbuster allergy drug Claritin, Dr. Angell demonstrates exactly how new products are brought to market. Drug companies, she shows, routinely rely on publicly funded institutions for their basic research; they rig clinical trials to make their products look better than they are; and they use their legions of lawyers to stretch out government-granted exclusive marketing rights for years. They also flood the market with copycat drugs that cost a lot more than the drugs they mimic but are no more effective. The American pharmaceutical industry needs to be saved, mainly from itself, and Dr. Angell proposes a program of vital reforms, which includes restoring impartiality to clinical research and severing the ties between drug companies and medical education. Written with fierce passion and substantiated with in-depth research, The Truth About the Drug Companies is a searing indictment of an industry that has spun out of control.

Download or read book Dictionary of Pharmaceutical Medicine written by Gerhard Nahler and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-06-29 with total page 186 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This dictionary is aimed primarily at the beginners entering the new discipline of Pharmaceutical Medicine, an area comprising aspects of toxicology, pharmacology, pharmaceutics, epidemiology, statistics, drug regulatory and legal affairs, medicine and marketing. But also more experienced colleagues in departments engaged in clinical development as well as researchers and marketing experts in the pharmaceutical industry will find concise and up-to-date information. The book is completed by a list of a about 1000 abbreviations encountered in pharmaceutical medicine and a compilation of important addresses of national and international health authorities.

Download or read book Deadly Medicines and Organised Crime written by Peter Gotzsche and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2019-08-21 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: PRESCRIPTION DRUGS ARE THE THIRD LEADING CAUSE OF DEATH AFTER HEART DISEASE AND CANCER. In his latest ground-breaking book, Peter C Gotzsche exposes the pharmaceutical industries and their charade of fraudulent behaviour, both in research and marketing where the morally repugnant disregard for human lives is the norm. He convincingly draws close co

Download or read book Handbook of Pharmaceutical Salts Properties Selection and Use written by P. Heinrich Stahl and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2008-08-04 with total page 392 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This comprehensive up-to-date guide and information source is an instructive companion for all scientists involved in research and development of drugs and, in particular, of pharmaceutical dosage forms. The editors have taken care to address every conceivable aspect of the preparation of pharmaceutical salts and present the necessary theoretical foundations as well as a wealth of detailed practical experience in the choice of pharmaceutically active salts. Altogether, the contributions reflect the multidisciplinary nature of the science involved in selection of suitable salt forms for new drug products.

Download or read book The Textbook of Pharmaceutical Medicine written by John P. Griffin and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2008-04-15 with total page 883 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New edition of succesful standard reference book for thepharmaceutical industry and pharmaceutical physicians! The Textbook of Pharmaceutical Medicine is the coursebookfor the Diploma in Pharmaceutical Medicine, and is used as astandard reference throughout the pharmaceutical industry. The newedition includes greater coverage of good clinical practice, acompletely revised statistics chapter, and more on safety. Coversthe course information for the Diploma in PharmaceuticalMedicine Fully updated, with new authors Greater coverage of good clinical practice and safety New chapters on regulation of medical devices in Europe andregulation of therapeutic products in Australia

Download or read book Drug Safety in Developing Countries written by Yaser Mohammed Al-Worafi and published by Academic Press. This book was released on 2020-06-03 with total page 656 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Drug Safety in Developing Countries: Achievements and Challenges provides comprehensive information on drug safety issues in developing countries. Drug safety practice in developing countries varies substantially from country to country. This can lead to a rise in adverse reactions and a lack of reporting can exasperate the situation and lead to negative medical outcomes. This book documents the history and development of drug safety systems, pharmacovigilance centers and activities in developing countries, describing their current situation and achievements of drug safety practice. Further, using extensive case studies, the book addresses the challenges of drug safety in developing countries. - Provides a single resource for educators, professionals, researchers, policymakers, organizations and other readers with comprehensive information and a guide on drug safety related issues - Describes current achievements of drug safety practice in developing countries - Addresses the challenges of drug safety in developing countries - Provides recommendations, including practical ways to implement strategies and overcome challenges surrounding drug safety

Download or read book Drugs for Life written by Joseph Dumit and published by Duke University Press. This book was released on 2012-09-03 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Challenges our understanding of health, risks, facts, and clinical trials [Payot]