|
||||||
|
|
|
|
|||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
DOC News asked:
do we expect too much from the consumer press? how well does the media cover health and medicine?
The media are looking for the sensational story to scoop their colleagues with. I wish they were held to some sort of standard to help protect the gullible public. The latest example: inhaled insulin (Exubera, Pfizer). It was splashed throughout the media in January 2006. Many people showed up on physicians' doorsteps only to learn that it won't be released until mid-summer at the earliest. This was quite a burn for these people.
Therese A. Landin, CDE Diabetes Educator Vail, Colo.
|
It depends on what media you're talking about. I'm from Canada. Some, like the CBC, our publicly funded radio, tend to do a better job with the details of health issues like diabetes and cardiovascular disease. [With] others, it's a little more spotty. More bad than good, I guess. The popular media tends to focus on quick solutions.
David Crouch Project Manager Institute of Nutrition, Metabolism, and Diabetes Canadian Institutes of Health Research Ottawa, Ontario
|
There are communities with television stations with health education that is part of their daily or weekly news production, and that is very helpful. There are other communities that have nothing. Obviously, you want more information out there.
Paul De Witt, MD Cardiac Surgeon Largo, Fla.
|
The media can definitely do a better job covering things. I don't think there's very good coverage of medical topics, but it may be our fault for not doing enough to bring news to the media's attention.
Christos Dimitriadis, MS Physical Activity Coordinator Frankfort, Ky.
We're a large medical center, and we do more than 1,000 open-heart cases a year. But I can't say that the local paper does much with medical topics at all. I haven't been pleased with much of their coverage of anything. I tend to check online to see what's the latest. You can get better information online, in my opinion. The papers haven't kept up.
James Cunningham, MD Cardiac Surgery/Critical Care Medicine Macon, Ga.
|
There's a lot of information that gets picked up by the media and inflated, so that what the public hears is contradictory, and they don't know what to believe. One study says wine is good for you, and another says it's not so good for you. One study says soy is good for you, and other says it's not so good for you. It's a lot of bits of information. As a diabetes educator, I get people coming back and saying they don't know what to believe.
Friend or foe? I think sometimes they raise more questions than they answer.
Kathy Rethman, RD, CDE Diabetes Educator Des Moines, Iowa
TALK BACK: THE PICTURE OF HEALTH
Nearly 10 years ago, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Modernization Act was passed to streamline and update the drug approval process—the first time in 35 years such changes were introduced. The new law included such provisions as a prescription drug user fee to pay for "fast track" approval, expanded access to experimental drugs and off-label uses, and other measures to make the approval of drugs and medical devices more efficient.
Modern pharmaceuticals save lives, prevent hospitalization and other costly medical care, and improve the quality of life for millions of Americans. At the same time, a number of high-profile drugs have been withdrawn from the market or subjected to restrictions.
In February 2005, to counter concerns of the public and prescribing doctors, the FDA launched a new drug safety board. One year later, the panel has been called a failure.1
Some critics suggest that members of FDA advisory panels are too close to industry and fail to apply strict standards to ensure public safety. A recent analysis by Knight-Ridder reporters indicates that the number of adverse event reports filed with the FDA is growing twice as fast as the number of prescriptions filled in the U.S.2 While the number of prescriptions filled rose 59% during 1994–2003, the number of adverse drug reaction reports soared by 145%, according to Knight-Ridder.
What do you think? Are drugs safer now than in years past?
Send your comments to docnews{at}diabetes.org.
References
2. Moynihan R, Bero L, Ross-Degnan D, et al.: Coverage by the news
media of the benefits and risks of medications. N Engl J
Med 342:1645–1650, 2000.
1. Wadman M: One year after launch, drug safety board is dubbed a failure. Nat Med 12:258, 2006.[Medline]
2. Pugh T, Borenstein S: American consumers suffering as more new drugs debut in U.S., analysis shows. Knight-Ridder, December 18, 2004. Available online at www.healthyskepticism.org/library/ref.php?id=268. Accessed June 2, 2006.
CiteULike 
Del.icio.us 
Digg 
Reddit 
Technorati What's this?
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||
|
| DOC News | Diabetes | Diabetes Care | Clinical Diabetes | Diabetes Spectrum |
