Question

What problems do some people see with the marketing of pharmaceuticals directly to non-physician customers?

Answer 1

Physicians know the medicines and other pharmaceutical products inside out, owing to their training and experience, and can analyse the relative merits and demerits of different products, and are capable of recommending the right product to a patient according to his / her specific conditions. The allopathic medicines as well as some other pharma products have side effects and in some cases hey can prove to be potentially dangerous ( even fatal) to some categories of patients. In this way if these products are marketed directly to the non physician customers such as patients or chemists, there are higher chances of self medication by the patients and medicine shops selling their goods directly to the patients without doctor's consultation, both of the situations might be dangerous for patients' well being. Therefore, the objective of selling directly to the physicians is to avoid such practices.