Archive for the ‘Arthritis’ Category
SOME CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM OF ARTHRITIS TREATMENT:
COMMERCIAL INTERESTS
Consider a company researching a new substance which has potential for treating a particular disease. Several factors influence the progress of this substance and its eventual destiny.
If the disease for which it is indicated is a serious one, the; product is likely to be a big money spinner. The project will then probably go ahead with maximum effort. If the disease is serious but not likely to involve good sales for the product (perhaps a disease of relatively low incidence), then the whole project may be abandoned in favour of another substance which is effective for some less serious condition, but still has good sales potential. This is straight commercialism and, of course, is quite justified in private enterprise where survival depends on sales.
Suppose, however, that the first case applies and the company proceeds to put the substance through all the trial procedures demanded by governmental agencies. These procedures can involve five to eight years of research and trials. The costs to the company will be enormous. Another company may also be progressing with research on a similar substance with indications for the same disease. Neither company will know of the other’s work and it then becomes a matter of who will gain official approval and the consequent prize – ‘the market’. Should one of the companies learn of the possibility of being ‘pipped to the post’ by another research project they may well decide to cut their losses and abandon the project. It could be that the product which would have resulted from this company’s research would have been an excellent one; due to a combination of circumstances it is, however, lost to the consumer.
A feature which comes into decisions regarding the acceptance of new substances officially classed as ‘drugs’, involves a comparison with other drugs used for the same disease. This brings the second aspect into play; that is, the basis of comparison involved in the acceptance of new ‘drugs’, or therapeutic substances.
It is valid to criticize a system which judges (and possibly rejects) new therapeutic substances by their comparative effectiveness with an exsiting substance. There are so many other factors which can be influential here, including, obviously, the difference in side-effects between the new substance and the existing one. Thus, a material which was only a quarter as potent or effective as another but which displayed an absence of serious side-effects would be a more valuable substance – for the patient. Furthermore, the new material may be more easily assimilated by patients than the one with which it was being compared. The effectiveness of a product involves a more widespread manifestation than just the speed by which it changes the course of a disease.
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