Prescriptions, Patients, Profits, Perils and Pro-People Choices

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Motivated drug consumers are eager to learn how to live healthier, happier lives while reducing both health-related costs and drug-related problems. The author explains it all in this timely and authoritative book. Consumer drug prices are the result of incremental contributions from discovery through dosage delivery system design, clinical trials, manufacturing, marketing and promotion, drug distribution through the drug supply chain, dispensing, and medication therapy management activities which promote healthy treatment outcomes. The author guides the reader through a complex maze of the drug discovery process, the regulatory approval system for drugs and supplements, benefits and risks associated with these products, and other medication-related problems, as well as threats to the nation's drug supply system, always with an eye toward consumer drug safety and costs. Anti-consumer, anti-competitive industry forces have powerful influences on consumer choice, drug prices and safety, and are all too often reinforced by government and judicial failures. In addition to adverse drug effects and medication errors, consumer self-inflicted drug-related problems are identified and explained. The author discusses the costs and consequences of these, including prescription drug misuse, overuse and abuse, and widespread failure to read labels and follow directions. The relationship between consumer drug and health literacy and these drug-related problems is disclosed. Understanding the relationships between these problems, unhealthy lifestyles, quality of life, and overall health-care spending is central to controlling costs and maximizing drug therapy effectiveness. Less expensive alternatives to brand-name prescription drug therapy include the use of less costly generic drugs and responsible self-care options, combining healthy lifestyles, OTC drugs, and selected alternative and complementary medicines, including dietary and judiciously selected herbal supplements. Self-medication and guidelines for safe and effective use are discussed.,