The Profitability of Prescription

My story is a little on the personal side but I decided I feel comfortable sharing it with you all. My most recent personal encounter with science and medicine began last year, as a sophomore in college. I was in with the doctor for a regular check-up and it went swimmingly. Perfect vision, reflexes, no alarming growths or tumors; all good. Throughout the appointment the "young adult" questions began making their way into the conversation. Any drug or alcohol use? Have I picked up smoking? Tanning? Do I understand the health risks involved with all of the above? The conversation then made it's natural progression of course, to birth control. Up until that point I had not been on the pill; although it seemed like all of my friends had been taking it since the early days of high school for everything from clear skin and regular periods to its intended use. I didn't have the need.

My doctor asked if it was something I was interested in. Until then I hadn't given it a second thought, but now that she was asking, sure, I guess I was interested. After all they were advertising "3 Periods a Year!" during every episode of Gilmore Girls I watched. Hell yeah. That was it, she gave me a 15 second run-down of the increased risk of clotting if you smoke (I don't), the importance of not missing a dose, and the fact that it won't prevent STD's. She handed me a prescription I could pick up later that day and boom, I was on the pill.

"Wow, that was easy" I thought. No...not quite. Three months later I was in the ER at Hennepin County Medical Center, in attack acardia as a result of a massive Bi-Pulmonary Embolism ( two large blood clots on either side of my lungs). Earlier that week I had begun having chest pain and shortness of breath, it reached it's worst one day at work. My boss insisted that I go to a Minute Clinic in the skyway instead of going home to rest. She saved my life. As soon as the nurse took my vitals I was being rushed to the hospital. The doctor told me that if I had gone home to rest as planned, I would've died. The I won't bore you with details of the aftermath but in a nutshell it included 3 days in the hospital, giving myself shots daily for a month, weekly visits to an anti-coagulation clinic, multiple CT Scans, prescription blood thinners, and a specific diet excluding vitamin K rich foods and alcohol.

Initially I was shocked and confused. I had to move home and my life had been completely re-arranged. I was under the impression that I was the unfortunate but exceedingly rare exception to an otherwise safe prescription. After further research I discovered that this is NOT AT ALL the case. I came across this blog (http://collegecandy.com/2009/06/09/birth-control-gave-me-blood-clots) and was shocked by the large number of young, healthy, non-smoking girls that had been through the exact same potentially fatal experience.

After looking thorough this blog and it's 8 pages of replies, as well as other similar forums, I am incredibly frustrated and angry that this problem is not being discussed. If there are this many girls who barely made it in time, how many did not? For those whose clots were fatal, were their loved ones told that the side effect was an incredibly rare outlying statistic? The profitability of these prescriptions has clearly overcome some of the very serious risks involved. Potentially fatal side effects are rushed into 3 seconds at the end of a commercial. I was under the impression that my risk was incredibly low, and had not been advised on the symptoms to watch for that would indicate a clot. I have found accounts from girls as young as 16 who almost died from blood clots because the pill was being used to clear up their acne. With so many other skin care products available should a pill that has such potentially serious side affects be "marketed" in that manner?! Should medications be "marketed" at all? It sure helps the drug company's bottom line, but what are the consequences? By that I mean the REAL consequences, not the lab reports contracted out by the company to ensure approval by the FDA. Every time I see a birth control commercial it makes me sick. Young healthy girls parade across the screen in sundresses, as if choosing what to put into your body to alter hormones should be as easy as choosing a lipstick color.

I also believe this relates to the over-medication of our society as a whole. It raises questions that relate to everything from Aderol to Prozac about the capitalization of prescriptions. Just because we CAN medicate something, does it mean we SHOULD? Is it worth the risk of a fatal clot if younger girl's sole use is to have fewer periods a year or less acne? Along the same lines as Nickolas' first post, it brings up issues about whether or not drug side-effects are causing more problems than the things they set out to "cure". In other contexts such as ADD the questions becomes something else. What are the potential capitalist benefits of defining a "disorder" and do they ever come into play? When we say that ADD needs to be "fixed" who decides that, and who has a financial profit to be gained?

As always, more questions than answers.