By Jonathan J. Darrow Questionable baldness remedies have been peddled since the beginning of medicine. According to Pliny (23-79 A.D.), ashes of seahorse could cure baldness. Almost 2000 years later, the British Medical Association warned the public of the increasing “number of preparations put forward for the cure of baldness,” particularly those which “are not…
By Jonathan J. Darrow In a well-researched, recent post, Patrick O’Leary addresses the FDA’s efficacy requirements as applied to an old drug, Acthar (corticotropin), that was first approved in 1952 and granted an orphan designation in 2010 for the treatment of infantile spasms. The initial approval therefore occurred before the Drug Amendments of 1962, which…
by Jonathan J. Darrow Until recently, most ordinary people had never heard of “pharmacy compounding.” Then, a number of deaths and illnesses caused by a drug that was compounded in a Framingham, Massachusetts pharmacy propelled drug compounding to the national spotlight (see, e.g., Denise Grady et al., Scant Oversight of Drug Maker in Fatal Meningitis…
by Jonathan J. Darrow On October 3, 2012, the FDA’s Division of Professional Drug Promotion issued an untitled letter to Genentech in connection with its cancer drug Tarceva. Tarceva (erlotinib) was approved in 2004 for the treatment of non-small cell lung cancer, and has since been approved, in combination with Gemzar (gemcitabine), for the treatment…
by Jonathan J. Darrow In a Petrie-Flom Center event last month, Dr. Alan Wertheimer raised the question of why consent is needed in ethical research. Without commenting on his answer to the question (attendees were asked not to do so), I would like to offer two principal lenses through which an answer can be understood:…
by Jonathan J. Darrow A research study reported today in the New England Journal of Medicine found that physicians are able to discriminate between clinical trials with high levels of rigor versus those with low levels of rigor, as well as between clinical trials that are funded by industry and those that are funded by…
by Jonathan J. Darrow The expiration of the patent on $11-billion-per-year Lipitor® (atorvastatin calcium) last November received wide media attention and was eagerly greeted by consumers, reflecting public excitement that seems to have not yet dissipated. In the following months, prices “plunged from about $175 a month for Lipitor to about $15 for generics,” according…
