Whose driving new Rx's ?

Sep/25/2007 06:15 Filed in: DTC Environment
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Slowly but surely there is a revolution taking place in healthcare...patient empowerment. More and more patients are now going into physicians offices armed with information from the Web and asking for particular brands and about different treatment options. While some physicians feel threatened others are embracing this new trend and will write what the patient asks for unless the physician feel strongly otherwise.




When it comes to healthcare baby boomers want to engage their physician in dialogue not a monologue. Patients are turning to the Web in droves to research medications and disease state information so that they can make educated choices on what's best for them. Most physicians will write what patients ask for but of course that is contingent on the medication and the condition for which it is being prescribed. When I recently talked with four physicians who have a 24 hour practice here in California they said that "even my Spanish speaking patients are asking for/about certain medications". This evolution was bound to happen.


Think about the typical office visit to a physicians office. You sit in a waiting room, then go to a treatment room and if your lucky get to spend 15-20 minutes with your doctor. People want to ensure that the limited time with their physicians is spent talking about treatments and medications that they have researched. Click stream analysis of several sites clearly shows that patients are going to pharma product sites but that they are also going to general health sites as well. They want information and want to be able to compare medications, especially the side effects. By the way the recent report from eMarketer clearly shows that pharma's credibility is in the toilet, another fact that most DTC marketers fail to acknowledge.


DTC at its best can inform and educate and at its worst can confuse patients and physicians. Physicians have long been acknowledged as the gate keepers to patients requests but that may be changing to ticket takers as patients come in and ask for prescriptions and doctors continue to treat the condition rather than the patient.

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