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Concept
Direct-to-consumer advertising
Summary
Direct-to-consumer advertising (DTCA) refers to the marketing and advertising of pharmaceutical products directly to consumers as patients, as opposed to specifically targeting health professionals. The term is synonymous primarily with the advertising of prescription medicines via mass media platforms—most commonly on television and in magazines, but also via online platforms.
Direct-to-consumer advertising is only completely legal in New Zealand and the United States, but are subject to regulations regarding the balanced disclosure of a prescription's benefits in comparison to its risks (including but not limited to side effects and contraindications), among other factors. Regulations regarding DTCA are typically applied to advertising materials that describe a prescription's indications and benefits, and may be more lenient to advertising materials which do not discuss uses. Many countries ban any advertising of prescription drugs directly to consumers.
There are ethical and regulatory concerns regarding DTCA, specifically the extent to which these ads may unduly influence the prescribing of the prescriptions based on consumer demands when, in some cases, they may not be medically necessary, or there are cheaper options available. Critics of DTCA have argued that too much is spent on marketing medications, rather than into research and development; in the United States, ad spending by drugmakers reached US$5.2 billion in 2016.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) defines several common types of DTCA for prescription medication:
A "product claim" advertisement identifies the nonproprietary and trade names of the medication, and contains at least one approved indication, and claims surrounding its benefits.
A "reminder" advertisement is designed to build brand recognition for a medication. Reminder ads cannot contain any information or imagery that pertain to the medication's approved uses, but may have themes that vaguely allude to them; for example, a reminder commercial for the erectile dysfunction drug Viagra featured scenes of a man happily walking to work to the showtune "Good Morning", emphasizing an innuendo in the lyric "it's great to stay up late".
Official source
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