The latest scandal to surface involves Seroquel (quetiapine), the mood disorder medication used to treat schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Seems like AstraZeneca was suppressing information about certain side effects – diabetes and weight gain – and telling drug reps in an internal email to “minimize and put a positive spin on safety data from a cursed quetiapine study.” 

Apparently they put quite the spin on it according to an article entitled,”Negative Data on Seroquel Allegedly Suppressed by Drugmaker” because the “promotional literature distributed in 1999 by AstraZeneca included a case study describing a diabetic patient who lost weight and stopped diabetic medications after switching to quetiapine from another antipsychotic drug.”

When drug companies won the right to advertise medications on mass media outlets, they had really won the rights to peddle their products on a unsuspecting, medically ignorant population, putting medical providers in the difficult position of fending off patients who insist they have certain diseases and need the medication they just saw on TV. After all, drug companies had only one market – medical providers – but now they could promote their products directly to Stud Smith who wants to enhance his sexual experience or Gourmet Gary who believes only the purple pill will alleviate his GERD symptoms. 

Drug companies have always sought to persuade practitioners to use their brand over the generic but when they cleverly enlisted the help of the general public to ask for specific medications, providers were under attack from two sides – with the public the unsuspecting victims of their unethical practices.

Why? Because drug companies have sought to cherry-pick the data on their drug reviews so that it’s almost impossible to really believe the drug reps who come into our offices. Time and time again, it eventually comes out that drug companies have suppressed data from the FDA or the public. Remember Vyoxx, Zyprexa, Bextra or the use of antidepressants in adolescents? 

So when will the suppression of important data by drug companies stop? I don’t have an answer for that except to say that there needs to be stiff penalties for suppression of drug safety information as well as a thorough review of how the FDA approves medications.