The relationship between physicians and the pharmaceutical industry Essay Example for Free

The relationship between physicians and the pharmaceutical industry Essay There are many issues involved with the relationship between physicians and the pharmaceutical industry. According to David Goldbloom, he proposed that gifts that the pharmaceutical industry wanted to give physicians should not be gifts, but instead should be materials that are sold to the physician at cost. This not only would avoid the appearance of impropriety, but would lower the overall cost of the drug to consumers. This position was picked up by the American Medical Students Association, who stated that there should be a complete ban on industry involvement in education. 2) Ethical and policy issues in research involving human participants. When a pharmaceutical company decides that they are going to conduct a human clinical trial, there are issues of the morality and ethics of conducting clinical trials. One of the first things is that the research subject must have full informed consent about the topic and the implications of the research that they are going to be involved in. Second, the government has in place in protecting the clinical research subject to assure that they are treated in an ethical way and are not subject to abuse or maltreatment in the clinical research process. In these regulations, the physical and emotional effects on the subject are minimized, additionally, the psychological and physical effects are reasonable, given the medical subject matter involved. Finally, all research involving human subjects must be analyzed and approved by the FDA in order to assure that the FDA’s guidelines are being met and that the research is indeed safe for human subjects. 3) Research involving persons with mental disorders that may affect decision-making capacity. Many of the same ethical considerations that involve research on human participants also apply to research trials on participants with mental disorders that may affect their decision making capacity. The only additional consideration is that there is an advocate for the person that should be in a position to assure that the medical and mental issues of the participant is indeed taken care of. Pharmaceutical companies should assure that all ethical guidelines and laws are followed to assure that those individuals with mental disorders are not taken advantage of in the clinical research process. 4) Bias in pharmaceutical sponsored (funded) clinical trials. There is a natural bias inherent in a pharmaceutical company conducting the clinical research on a drug. First, the pharmaceutical company has invested years and millions of dollars in developing and refining a drug. If that drug is not approved, they are out all that time and money. The individuals that work for the company and that are conducting the testing may feel pressured to manipulate the results to come out a certain way to assure that the company does not lose the money and time they have invested in the drug development process. 5) Relationship between clinical investigators and the pharmaceutical industry. When clinical investigators are investigating the efficacy of a drug, they should avoid the appearance of impropriety by working to maintain their independence. The investigator should not have any relationship with the industry in which they work. This helps them to maintain their independence and they are better able to accomplish their job in an efficient and professional manner. Investigators should also avoid paid consultancies as they give the appearance of a conflict of interest. Investigators are there to investigate the efficacy of the drug in question, and they should be left to do their job without being pressured to achieve a certain result for the pharmaceutical company. 6) Corporate hand in clinical trials and their contracts with academia. The corporate hand in academia should be one that is very light. There should be a full disclosure of all fiduciary obligations that academia has with the corporate world, and it should be up to an independent panel to determine if that financial relationship is affecting the academic independence of the researcher. Contracts with academia should be ones that do not have any implicit or explicit strings attached, and should not be contingent on a certain performance level. Works Cited (1999, March 11). Research Involving Individuals with Questionable Capacity to Consent: . Retrieved June 20, 2009, from U. S. Department of Health and Human Services Web site: http://grants. nih. gov/grants/policy/questionablecapacity. htm Bero, L. (2003, June 11). Corporate and Economic Pressures on Academic Freedom. Retrieved June 20, 2009, from University of California Web site: http://www. universityofcalifornia. edu/senate/committees/ucaf/afforum/bero. pdf Chopra, S. (2003, July 2). Industry Funding of Clinical Trials: Benefit or Bias?. Retrieved June 20, 2009, from www. jama. ama-assn. org Web site: http://jama. ama-assn. org/cgi/reprint/290/1/113. pdf Goldbloom, D. S. Physicians and the Pharmaceutical Industry . Retrieved June 20, 2009, from Canadian Psychiatric Association Web site: http://ww1. cpa- apc. org:8080/publications/archives/bulletin/2003/october/editorialEn. asp Kapp, M. B. (2006). Ethical and legal issues in research involving human subjects: do you want a piece of me?. Retrieved June 20, 2009, from Journal of Clinical Pathology Web site: http://jcp. bmjjournals. com/cgi/content/full/59/4/335 Panacek, E Guidelines for Clinical Investigator Involvement in Industry-sponsored Clinical Trials. Retrieved June 20, 2009, from www. saem. org Web site: http://www. saem. org/download/edward. pdf

Birth Order Essay -- Analysis, Alfred Adler

Dating all the way back to the late 1800’s, Birth order has been studied thoroughly. An incredible amount of psychologist and doctors have studied how birth order, or a person’s rank by age among his or her siblings, can affect a child’s personality. Researchers find it difficult to find conclusions due to the fact that it is hard to establish a control group that has controlled variables. Experts say that â€Å"different social status, location of the family, and size of the family can create confusion and affect the quality of conclusions† (Hartshone par. 2). The first study done was by Alfred Adler, an Austrian psychiatrist born in 1870-1937. Adler argued that â€Å"birth order can leave an indelible impression on an individual’s style of life† (Voo Par. 2). A child’s â€Å"style of life† is one’s habitual way of dealing with the tasks of love, friendship, and work. Alfred Adler’s study concluded that birth order can affect all aspects of the developing child. According to Adler, â€Å"First-borns are forcefully taken off their throne when the second child comes along, which could create lasting controversy between them. He said, â€Å"The younger children may be pampered and spoiled† (Haines Par. 3). This may leave an effect on their later personalities. He also wrote about how other things should be considered in regards to the birth order outcomes such as the number of years between the birth of the oldest, middle, and youngest child. Experts have found that each child, depending on bi rth order, has certain tendencies. Nature vs. Nurture has much to do with the way a child’s personality will be formed. â€Å"Certainly, many individual traits and tendencies among brothers and sisters are the products of a unique arrangement of genes (Renkl Par. 2).†... ...nil.† (Education Par. 6) They did however, say that the only study which did show birth order effects apparent were the ones that were judged by their parents or siblings. The researchers were not the ones to find the effects. Therefore, this made the study result in there not being effects on birth order. This is just one example of how birth order is a very disputing and controversial study going on. In conclusion, birth order is indeed studied very thoroughly. Birth order can be the result of a unique arrangement of genes, or it can be the way you were raised and the environment you grew up in. Birth order may not even affect your personality at all! Psychologist and doctors will continue to work on new experiments and studies. New information is released all the time. There is no doubt we will have a much better understanding of birth order in the future.

Chapter 16 Summary Essay

In this chapter we are going to learn about therapy, treating psychological disorders, evaluating psychotherapies, the biomedical therapies, and preventing psychological disorders. You have three ways on how to treat disorders. They are psychotherapy, biomedical therapy, and eclectic approach. Psychotherapy is treatment involving psychological techniques consisting of interactions between some seeking to overcome difficulties and a trained therapist. Biomedical therapy is prescribed medicine that acts differently on every person’s physiology. Lastly eclectic approach is an approach on the client’s problems which uses various forms of therapy. Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalysis was the first of the therapies to be formed. The techniques that we have are resistance, interpretation, and transferring. Interpretation is noting supposed dream meaning’s and other significant behaviors and events in order to promote insight. We have psychodynamic therapies which is a tradition that views on individuals when they respond to unconscious forces and childhood experiences. There are three psychotherapy skeptics which are people often need therapy when they are in crisis, clients need to believe that doing therapy will eventually help them with their problems, and clients need to speak kindly to their therapist and to respect what they have to say. Many studies are digested by what they call meta-analysis. Various therapies which have three benefits. These benefits are hope for demoralized people, a new perspective of the way we look at things, and a trusting, caring, empathetic relationship. The emotion between the client and his/her therapist is called therapeutic alliance which is a key concept to being a therapist. In our world we have antipsychotic drugs, antidepressant drugs, and mod-stabilizing medications. Antipsychotic drugs are drugs used to schizophrenia and other severe disorders. While antidepressant drugs are used to treat depression and anxiety disorders. Electroconvulsive therapy is a therapy for severely depressed patients which is a brief electric current sent through the brain.

Mass Media’s Undermining of Societal Values During Health...

Mass Media’s Undermining of Societal Values During Health Care Reform There is little doubt that three years ago the American people wanted health care reform. News media saw the controversy over health care reform as a strong issue to discuss in their productions, and most fulfilled their responsibility as an information medium: to provide equal opportunity for both sides of this debate to reveal the benefits of their plans and the drawbacks of their opponents’. However, when interest groups became involved in this dispute, advertising their own beliefs against the Clinton Health Care Reform Plan, they manipulated the public by using scare tactics. News media incorporated these ads in their coverage of the benefits and†¦show more content†¦Page 2 Before the Clinton Health Care Reform initiative was ever mentioned, news media knew society valued a better and reformed health care system. Initially much of mass news media reflected that the American public wanted health care reform. On March 22, 1994, the Illinois Business Review published an article called â€Å"National Health Care Reform: Comparing Four Alternative Plans†. The introduction of this article had three amazing statistics from a Gallop poll in 1991 which bluntly stated that a majority of Americans wanted health care reform. Ninety- one percent of the persons polled said they believed that there was a health care crisis, and eighty- five percent said they felt that there was a need for reform (Reich 3). Approximately eighty percent were either very or somewhat satisfied with their health insurance, but complained about poor coverage and cost (Reich 3). For those who could not afford health care, eighty percent said they believed that the government should pick up the tab (Reich 3). These three statistics displayed that a majority of Americans polled valued health care reform. The prime objective of universal health care is to insure every citizen, especially the twenty six million Americans who have no health care insurance and who valued this initiative the most. Because health care reform was popular as reflected in poll data, it seemed inevitable. When the Clinton’s mentioned their plan, it won much public support. This