Drug Promotional Literature is an important aspect in Pharma industry. Learning about it is a requirement for undergraduate medical students in the CBME curriculum

1. Dr. Lavanya SH
Associate Professor
Department of Pharmacology
BGSGIMS
Drug Promotional Literature

2. Scenario
 You are sitting at your desk, leafing through a recent
issue of a Medical Journal.
 You come across an ad
for Clopidogrel which states that this medication
reduces the risk of cardiovascular events by 9
compared to aspirin.
 You wonder if you should be switching all your
patients to Clopidogrel from Aspirin

3. Drug Promotion
 What is it?
“All informational and persuasive activities by
manufacturers and distributors, the effect of which is to
influence the prescription, supply, purchase or use of
medicinal drugs“
WHO definition

4. Aggressive Marketing Strategies of
Pharmaceutical Giants.....
Ref:
https://www.reddit.com/r/business/comments/9d7dvm/big_pharma_companies_spend_m
ore_on_marketing_than/

5. Drug Promotion: Facts
11% of verbal
statements about drugs
by representatives are
inaccurate
Only 25% physicians are
aware that info provided is
wrong

6. Critical Evaluation
Of any Source of Drug
Information......Before blindly accepting
them...........Need of the Hour!!

7. Sources of Drug Information
 Journals, Reference Books, Drug Bulletins, Drug Information
Centres, Pharmaceutical Industry, Conferences & CMEs,
Internet

8. IPL, BPL, ..................What’s DPL??
Printed
Electronic
Reminder
Advertisements
Advertisements
to general public
Flip charts, Brochures,
Leaflets, journal
advertisement

9. WHO criteria for Pharma Industries for
completeness of DPL

11. All components included......Does it give
complete picture of medicine’s safety ??
 Conceal info about ADRs, contraindications, adjuvants,
drug interactions
 Pictorial depictions
Unacceptable
graphics
InappropriateClaims
Inadequate
References
Validity of
scientific
claims

12. Appropriateness of Illustrations
 Drug name size
 Type & Relevance of Picture
 Scientific Tables & Graphs – Are graphs telling the
truth?
 Does the size of the effect shown equal the size
of the effect in the data?
 Is only a small percentage of the possible event
rate displayed?
 Is there any misuse of statistics and graphics, over-stating
of results, and employing fallacious reasoning

13. (Advertisement fromthe
Canadian Medical
Association Journal, 13
September 2005.)
Putting the medicine
“at the top of your
list” to treat children

14. Critical thinking is key to good
prescription!