E-DRUG: News item unethical marketing US (cont)
-----------------------------------------------
Can some US e-druggers give some background on this news-item?
This is the latest episode in a story that goes back several
years. It started with an attempt to suppress the results
of a bioequivalence study of four brands of levothyroxine.
There's an AMA Science News item about this (from 1997) at
http://www.ama-assn.org/sci-pubs/sci-news/1997/snr0416.htm
The study article
Bioequivalence of Generic and Brand-name Levothyroxine Products in the
Treatment of Hypothyroidism
Betty J. Dong, PharmD; Walter W. Hauck, PhD; John G. Gambertoglio,
PharmD; Lauren Gee, MPH; John R. White, PharmD; Jeff L. Bubp, PharmD;
Francis S. Greenspan, MD
JAMA. 1997;277:1205-1213
can be read in full at
http://www.ama-assn.org/sci-pubs/journals/archive/jama/vol_277/no_15/o
c7007.htm
(If the URL is wrapped in your mail reader there's a link to this
page at the bottom of the news item.)
An associated editorial detailing the attempts by successive
companies to suppress the publication of the study results can
be found at
http://www.ama-assn.org/sci-pubs/journals/archive/jama/vol_277/no_15/e
d7011x.htm
The official Canadian monograph for Knoll's product (Synthroid)
still contains the claim that their product is noninterchangeable
with others. The College of Pharmacists in British Columbia
continues to take the unsupportable (and ignorant) position that
levothyroxine products are noninterchangeable.