Patients benifit from the promotion of good drugs

Editor - In response to Griffith's and Anderson's contributions on the role of pharmaceutical reps I would like to add a few observations.^1,2 I am a medical student with experience as a pharmaceutical representative. Thankfully, I enjoyed my time in the industry. This is because there are many doctors who do appreciate the service that ethical companies provide. In any other industry good service would be praised. Representatives perform a variety of functions described by Anderson and are also trained to sell their product.

I disagree with Griffith's suggestion that companies try to hide this area of expertise. There is nothing bad about being able to sell a point of view. Doctors sell treatments to their patients and ideas to their colleagues. It is naive to think that all doctors will be continually up to date from other sources of information; most will admit to a pile of unread journals. It is also naive to think that good drugs will automatically sell themselves; they need promoting. Griffiths does us all a disservice when he says that doctors will be brainwashed into prescribing ineffective and expensive drugs if they allow a representative in for five minutes. Clearly, pharmaceutical companies exist to make profit, but the research based companies make this profit by bringing new and innovative medicines to the patients that need them by promoting them. These activities can be complementary to the need to put the patient first. I agree that doctors need to analyse objectively all data put before them. They must be able to make an unbiased decision about the best treatment for the patient. By labelling all contact with pharmaceutical companies as "bad" we will, however, run the risk of denying our patients the benefits of many treatments.

Sarah Stephan, second year medical student, University of Wales College of Cardiff, Cardiff CF1 3XP


studentBMJ 1999;07:394-436 November ISSN 0966-6494

1. Anderson K. The life of a medical representative - a little food for thought. studentBMJ 1999;7:336. (September.)
2. Griffith D. Do today's doctors really need pharmaceutical reps? studentBMJ 1999;7:337. (September.)