Posted on 05/26/2002 12:53:46 PM PDT by Al B.
Edited on 09/03/2002 4:50:34 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
PHILADELPHIA -- In the days leading up to the American Psychiatric Association's annual meeting here this past week, pharmaceutical companies mailed attendees hundreds of free phone cards, as well as invitations to museums, jazz concerts and fancy dinners. . . And in several dozen symposiums during the weeklong meeting, companies paid the APA about $50,000 per session to control which scientists and papers were presented and to help shape the presentations.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Anyway, this article ties in to some old FR classics related to drug co. influence on psychiatric medicine. Many of the following are yours:
This place just ain't what it used to be without people like you, Joe.
Oh, and the phony title you gave to the Washington Post article violates posting rules. Get a grip.
It must suck being a scientologist.
I'll bet that Lisa MacPherson's family wishes that she had been treated by these "evil" psychs, eh?
Wouldn't know. How's things in Indianapolis today? Did Lilly give you the day off?
"As thousands of psychiatrists streamed into town, they were greeted by a highway billboard advertising AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals's anti-psychotic medicine Seroquel. Each of the 19,000 attendees was given a gray bag with the insignia of the meeting and the orange logo of GlaxoSmithKline PLC, the maker of the antidepressant Paxil. Outside the giant convention center, curb signs for buses ferrying doctors to their hotels advertised Eli Lilly and Co., the maker of Prozac."
Yeah, sounds real discreet to me.
How absolutely horrible - companies ADVERTISING in the free market! (gasp). Talk about corporate welfare - each and every one of those companies should immediately declare themselves as churches and get all those nice tax write-offs and freedom from government regulation. They could even get John Travolta to do their TV commercials.
I know, it's all just harmless promotional stuff. Apparently not everyone got the word on that, though. You need to get with it.
I didn't know who Lisa MacPherson was and looked her up on a search engine.
This was a young girl "treated" by the scientologists in one of their concentration camps. There were before and after photos. Her corpse was absolutely unrecognizable when the scientologists were through torturing and murdering her.
Yup - the Fort Harrison Hotel. The coroner actually found cockroach bites on portions of her exposed skin at the autopsy (for which scientologists used every underhanded legal tactic to halt; I wonder why). She lived in filth and terror for the last weeks of her life, all under the tender "ministrations" of this sham church, due to injuries from a traffic accident that any podunk small town ER could have treated in a matter of a few hours.
It was unforgiveable of me not to post the URL of the best source for information about this victim of the clams, www.lisamcpherson.org.
Couldn't have said it better myself (except maybe for adding "LEGAL, harmless promotional stuff.")
Sure, if bought-and-paid-for medicine is your thing.
"And in several dozen symposiums during the weeklong meeting, companies paid the APA about $50,000 per session to control which scientists and papers were presented and to help shape the presentations."
"Some psychiatrists said the association should simply sever all ties with industry."
You need to tell your masters in Indianapolis that everybody's not getting the word here.
Wouldn't know. Tell you what though; have your masters in Clearwater, FL call my masters in Indianapolis and we'll do lunch. Know any places that do a good clam chowder?
ROTFLMAO
I like your style. You do have a way with words.
| This relationship is dangerous because researchers and psychiatrists then feel indebted to the drug companies, remain biased in favor of drug cures, downplay side effects and seldom try other types Of interventions. And they know they have the unspoken blessing of the APA to do so. Collectively, these practices aggressively promote reliance on prescription drug use--so much so that many people think drugs should be forced on those who refuse to take them. The APA supports the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, which believes that mentally ill patients should be coerced to take medication. I am appalled by this level of social control. Mentally ill people should be given a choice to have their illness treated in alternative ways. Over the last decade, I have written a number of letters bringing my concerns to the APA's attention but have received no response. The association claims that what it's doing is in the "best interest of patients," but its strong ties to the drug industry suggest otherwise. Recently, it was dues-paying time for the APA, and I sat there looking at the form. I thought about the unholy alliance between the association and the drug industry. I thought about how consumers are being affected by this alliance, about the overuse of medication, about side effects and about alternative treatments. I thought about how irresponsibly some of my colleagues are acting toward the general public and the mentally ill. And I realized, I want no part of it anymore. Loren Mosher, M.D. |
Here's a piece from the Philly paper on this: As psychiatrists meet, drug companies pounce.
| Some of the drug-company exhibits were unquestionably interesting. A high point was "The Bus Ride," a chance to feel schizophrenic for four minutes, offered by Janssen Pharmaceutica, maker of Risperdal, a drug for treating schizophrenia. The "bus" is four yellow pyramid-shaped modules. The multimedia program that participants see was designed with the help of a group of people who suffer from schizophrenia. "Riders" sit alone on a bus seat in the module and watch screens showing the front and side windows and the driver's rearview mirror. They are on a trip to - where else? - the pharmacy. Unfortunately, they've gone too long without their medication. As the bus begins to move, the rider hears voices from all around. It's difficult to separate one voice from the others. A biker appears beside the bus and says, "Hey, you, get off the bus now." The driver loudly says, "You have God-given rights," then morphs into a young woman who says, "Hi. Welcome back. Are you having a nice ride today, Your Highness?" The bus appears to veer and the street looks distorted. Eventually, it arrives at the rider's stop. "Hey, you don't look so good," the driver says. "Maybe you should have gone to that pharmacy sooner." Lilly's competing "Journey of Hope" takes one through a tunnel with different stops in a young schizophrenic's life. The tunnel, which works in English, French, German, Italian, Japanese and Spanish, shows the man's growing paranoia and estrangement. At the end, though, he's doing much better, after forming a "therapeutic alliance" with the doctor who prescribed Zyprexa, Lilly's drug. Is this is what it takes to stand out from the competition? Marni Lemons, a Lilly spokesperson, said: "Certainly, we're aware that we have a number of other companies here at the APA with whom we compete for a share of voice, but we're just interested in doctors having a chance to get a real feel for what it's like to have schizophrenia." |
I am not totally against medication. I knew this really psychotic retarded man who responded to Depakote. It really allowed him to lead a functional life. I asked why he was taken off of it. It was too costly. Since it was a new drug at the time, it had to be pushed by the drug companies and this drove the costs up. These high flying junkets with all the perks are costs that are passed on to the customer. Granny can't afford her pain pill because Doctor Feelgood is listening to jazz in Aruba courtesy of the pharmaceutical companies.
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