english.prescrire.org > Spotlight > Archives : 2007 > Pharmaceutical companies' "compliance support programmes" should not be legalised

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Pharmaceutical companies' "compliance support programmes" should not be legalised

Pharmaceutical companies are offering more and more drug "compliance support programmes". These industry-driven programmes should be banned.

Medical professionals and patients’ associations have long been on hand to help patients to choose the most appropriate treatments, and to support patients when necessary in following their treatments.

The so-called "compliance support programmes" being introduced by certain pharmaceutical companies to "help" patients follow complicated and costly treatments proceed more from the companies' need to hold onto their customers than from patients' own needs.

For instance, one company set up such a programme for a drug indicated for menopausal women suffering from established osteoporosis. In fact, there is a better-evaluated drug for this indication which has been proven effective in preventing fractures, is easier to take and costs a tenth of the price. Who really benefits from this particular "compliance support programme"?

Pharmaceutical companies are the worst placed to support patients in their treatment. Their "compliance support programmes" should not be given regulatory approval but quite simply banned, as required by the legislation that prohibits advertising drugs directly to the consumer.

For more information on these programmes and on the Medicines in Europe Forum campaign against their legalisation, go to www.prescrire.org

©Prescrire January 2007

Source: "Programmes industriels d’"aide à l’observance" : non merci !" Rev Prescrire 2007 ; 27 (279) : 61-62.

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