E-DRUG: Drug info to generalists and promotional spending in France
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Dear E-druggers
In September 2007, the French General Inspectorate of Social
Affairs produced a report on the information given to generalist doctors about medicines. The 252 page report (the report is brief, the annexes
more detailed) in French is available from:
http://lesrapports.ladocumentationfrancaise.fr/BRP/074000703/0000.pdf
[please fix link if broken] and contains a lot of interesting information
about the medical detailing visit, how information is provided, its
effects on prescribing and how it is viewed from different perspectives.
Part of the report also examines promotional spending in France. I have
provided a rough translation of this portion of the report below (as fair use).
Regards,
Douglas Ball
Independent consultant
douglasball[AT]yahoo.co.uk
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1.2.1 The promotional expenses of the pharmaceutical industry.
The promotional spending of the pharmaceutical industry in
France were estimated, by the LEEM, at an average of 12% of sales between
1999 and 2004; 12.3% in 2003 and 12.2% in 2004 being 2.8 thousand million
euros out of 22.8 thousand million euros of sales in 2004.
The stable nature of the promotional spending as a percentage of strongly
growing sales hides a large increase in these types of spending: 48%
between 1999 and 2005 in today's euros.
In 2004, the expenses were made up of 75.8% to medical
detailing, the rest being dedicated to advertising (13.4%), congresses
(8.6%), and to samples (2.2%). This distribution, approximately stable over
the past years, is similar to that of other countries of a comparable level
of economic development. However, the part given by the French companies
to medical detailing is much higher than neighbouring countries and the
USA: 73% in France, compared to 68% in Europe and 59% in the USA (see
Annexes 4 and 5).
However, these expenses appear to be largely underestimates. Eurostaf has
calculated the total costs of a medical detailing visit by including
notably the managers and those of supervising the detailing networks, and
leading to, only for medical detailing visits, a ratio of 14% of sales.
Although we don't have the exact figures, it appears that the intensity of
medical detailing is close to that of the USA and greater than that in
other European countries (see Annex 5).