Unfortunately, some advertising for pharmaceutical products still falls short when it comes to fully informing patients about the appropriate uses for a product. I think this is better now than in years past, but there is still room for improvement by some advertisers and those that fall short need to improve. Of course, the FDA sometimes forces an “improvement” on some advertisers, but my experience has been that most marketers want to both comply with applicable regulations and create useful, effective and accurate messages. Many companies continue to invest heavily in improving the effectiveness of their patient communications even when they are well within the bounds of FDA regulations, because they want to communicate with their consumers in the most effective manner possible. This continued emphasis on effective communication about a sponsor’s product – including the best ways to present risk information and gain patient understanding, in addition to interest in the product, is likely one of the best ways to improve the situation you describe.

A second area in which sponsors/advertisers should focus to improve the patient’s knowledge is in emphasizing an integrated approach to their communications strategy that includes a variety of communications channels for both the patient and the professional audience (physicians, nurses and pharmacists, as well as other providers). Marketers who elect to utilize only “mass media” DTC advertising (TV and print) may be effective in gaining the consumer’s attention and generating interest in their product, but they may be offloading much of the responsibility for patient education to professionals, and creating the situation you describe. With only a modest shift in resources that still invests in these traditional outlets if desired, marketers can generate interest in their product while also providing consumers with additional methods of obtaining information. These can effectively augment the patient’s knowledge and lead to a much-improved physician-patient visit. Interactive and CRM programs come to mind, as do additional point-of-care communications such as the pharmacy.

An additional point that deserves attention is the role of the health care provider (the physician and hospital, in your example) in making sure the physician is properly informed. Increasingly, health care organizations are banning pharmaceutical company personnel from having contact with the health care providers that staff their facilities. While some controls over these interactions are likely necessary and prudent, I don’t believe it is wise for healthcare organizations to ban all contact and interaction. Pharmaceutical companies can play a useful role in educating both consumers and professionals, so long as the information they provide is accurate and balanced, and presented in a way that doesn’t inappropriately influence the information recipient (professional or consumer) or interfere with patient care. We hear much about the situations in which this is not the case, but industry can play an effective role in this area. I am hopeful that health care organizations will find ways to work with the pharmaceutical industry to establish policies and practices that foster useful exchanges of information rather than banning contact by their staff with the industry altogether.

Finally, it is worth noting that the situation you describe is that of a dialogue between the physician and patient, which can lead to both parties having a better understanding of the patient’s needs and potential treatments. Creating and encouraging that conversation is one of the most helpful things that can occur in the physician-patient relationship. Even in cases where the patient has an incomplete understanding of the product in question, it’s better to have their misconception corrected by their physician or pharmacist than have the patient continue on without that guidance. It can admittedly be annoying for the professional, but patient counseling “comes with the territory” and in my opinion a reasonable amount of this dialogue is an obligation of practicing in a modern society, with an audience of consumers that will continue to have access to multiple sources of information. If we are smart about how we conduct ourselves as an industry, we can do much to ensure that those conversations are well-informed and useful to all involved parties.