Lessons learned from You-Know-Who
Duchesnay Inc.’s 15-minutes of fame for its morning sickness drug arguably turned into a few hours’ worth by time the drugmaker complied with an FDA warning letter demanding a corrective ad to offset the omission of risk information in paid…
The next episode of the American horror story
You’ve likely heard the terrified screams induced by the cost of pricey cancer drugs, Gilead Sciences Inc.’s twin hepatitis C therapies and Vertex’s cystic fibrosis breakthroughs. And you may have been rattled by the nightmarish predictions about how a new…
Utopia, dystopia: Separating truth from fiction in bioethics discussions
Let’s face it: Imagining the means of humanity’s ultimate destruction makes for great entertainment. There are no shortages of novels, movies and television shows featuring threats of global annihilation – zombie viruses, meteors hurtling through space, nuclear warfare – or…
A world of intrigue, from Missoula to Mars: BioWorld’s 9th Annual Summer Reading List
Summer is not officially here, according to the calendar, but the first long weekend of the season brings thoughts of beaches, mountains, travel, relaxation, lazy days and active ones. No matter what floats your boat over summer vacation, a good…
You’ve come a long way, baby, but still a long way to go
Patients have come a long way to get a say in the drug development and approval process. But there’s still some ground to cover if they’re going to move from the passive subject role to a 50-50 partnership that reminds…
As researchers unlock the brain’s mysteries, let’s not overlook the real questions
Covering the American Academy of Neurology’s (AAN) 67th annual meeting in Washington – a gathering of nearly 13,000 clinicians, researchers, students, industry reps and even a few patients – was an exercise in exhaustion and a labor of love. I…
Talk to your doctor: How even annoying DTC ads can contribute to patient communication
A few years ago I went to the nearby immediate care with a minor but irritating cough that wouldn’t go away. Three visits later – after two utterly ineffectual rounds of antibiotics and a prescription for a cough medicine that…
Sharing deeply of ourselves: Still messy
In the capital of digital sharing and over-sharing, Silicon Valley, contributing one’s whole genome to science in the name of fun and self-knowledge has never felt that controversial. Engineers share software code liberally every day on sites like GitHub and…
Patient engagement as important as the data
The thought of having unfettered access to all the medical and genomic data of a million Americans had researchers gathered at the National Institutes of Health’s first workshop on precision medicine licking their lips. Almost giddy with excitement, they contemplated…
Listening to the voice that matters
Since being diagnosed with cancer a few months ago, I have been in an unwanted crash course on the patient perspective of everything I’ve been writing about biopharma for the past several years. It’s an eye-opener. Genetic testing, lack of…
