Is pharma spending on marketing too low?

Many people view marketing as an inefficient waste of money. Without marketing, however, physicians and patients would not be aware of new products. Marketing is especially important for new pharmaceuticals. While the price of branded pharmaceuticals may be high in some cases, the marginal cost of production (not counting R&D costs) is low; and often…

Does drug detailing affect prescribing patterns?

The obvious answer seems to be ‘yes’.  Why would pharmaceutical companies spend billions of dollars on drug detailing (i.e., visits by pharmaceutical representatives to physicians to explain drug benefits) and drug samples if they don’t work?   When I say billions, I mean billions: A new study by Datta and Dave (2017), however, finds that drug…