Almost half of sales visits by pharmaceutical company representatives advocating the use of the drug gabapentin led to doctors stating that they intended to increase their prescription of the drug or recommend it to colleagues, according to an analysis of a survey completed by the doctors shortly after the visits.
An anti-reflux valve developed to help esophageal cancer patients also has been shown to help those with bile duct obstruction, according to Kulwinder S. Dua, M.D., a research physician at the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee.
Many studies in coaching literature have found that male athletes tend to prefer a male coach. Newly released research from the University of Alberta has indicated that male athletes actually prefer a female team physician to attend to their medical issues, including those related to sexual health.
Employers can blame hay fever for the loss of millions of hours of work productivity this spring. A new study of nearly 600 people with hay fever symptoms, including sneezing, watery eyes and runny and itchy noses, found that workers missed an hour of work per week during peak hay fever season.
Despite the potential for conflict of interest, virtually all practicing physicians in the U.S. have some form of relationship with pharmaceutical manufacturers but the nature and extent of those relationships vary, depending on the kind of practice, medical specialty, patient mix, and professional activities, reports a study in the April 26 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced the entry of a Consent Decree of Permanent Injunction against PharmaFab Inc., its subsidiary, PFab LP, and two company officials, Mark Tengler, PharmaFab’s president, and Russ McMahen, PFab’s vice president of scientific affairs, to stop the illegal manufacture and distribution of prescription and over-the-counter drug products.
An anti-reflux valve developed to help esophageal cancer patients also has been shown to help those with bile duct obstruction, according to Kulwinder S. Dua, M.D., a research physician at the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee.
A Rochester physician is helping to coordinate the national response against lupus. I?aki Sanz, M.D., professor of Medicine, Microbiology and Immunology, has been named chair of the research committee of the Lupus Foundation of America.
When does the wait time for cataract surgery cross over from being inconvenient to affecting health and quality of life? Dr. William Hodge and colleagues report on their systematic review of studies that assessed the relation between wait times for cataract surgery and patient outcomes.
In a unique collaborative paper in PLoS Medicine, a former drug rep and a physician who researches drug marketing reveal the tactics used by drug reps to manipulate physicians into selling drugs.