RKS Health – A Bird's Eye View of Fashion, Food, Travel, Culture, Beverage and Curiosity

RKS Health: Beware of Drug Companies Clinical Trials!

“First, commercially sponsored clinical trials report favourable conclusions about the sponsor’s drug or device 34 percent more frequently than non-commercially funded trials do. Moreover, when the principal investigator of a published clinical trial has financial ties to the manufacturer of the drug being studied-as is the case in two-thirds of published clinical trials-the odds areContinue reading “RKS Health: Beware of Drug Companies Clinical Trials!”

RKS Health: U.S.A. Big Pharma Where Sales and Marketing Trump Research

“In fact, shaping doctors’ beliefs has become the drug companies’ primary job. To this end, the majority of the largest drug companies spend twice as much on sales and marketing as they do on research and development of the drugs themselves. And a quarter of those spend ten times as much on sales and marketing.Continue reading “RKS Health: U.S.A. Big Pharma Where Sales and Marketing Trump Research”

RKS Health; Skyrocketing Health Costs in the United States and Decreasing Healthy Life Expectancy

“Back in 1980, the United States spent 8.2% of GDP on health-care, virtually the same as the second highest spending country (Germany at 8.1 percent) and just 1.7 percent above the average of ten comparable countries. But as discussed in the introduction, by 2019 American health-care spending had skyrocketed to 17.7 percent of US GDP.Continue reading “RKS Health; Skyrocketing Health Costs in the United States and Decreasing Healthy Life Expectancy”

RKS Health: The Central Strategy of Big Pharma

“Between 1991 and 2017, drug companies paid more than $38 billion in fines and settlements to federal and state governments: many of those companies-including Merck pleaded guilty to having misled doctors and the public about drug safety and efficacy. (GlaxoSmith Kline led the pack with $7.9 billion in financial penalties). Even so that seemingly enormousContinue reading “RKS Health: The Central Strategy of Big Pharma”

RKS Health: Misleading Physicians to Increase Sales

“The Kaiser v. Pfizer trial provided two key lessons about drug company marketing: First, because drug companies fund most of the research about their drugs and control the resulting data, they can (and do) mislead physicians in order to increase sales. And, second, under our current system, it is more profitable for large pharmaceutical companiesContinue reading “RKS Health: Misleading Physicians to Increase Sales”

RKS Health: Should the Real Goal to be Lower Cholesterol?

“Americans and their health care providers must remember that the real goal is not to have the lowest cholesterol level but to have the lowest risk of heart disease and stroke. Had the guidelines Jane’s doctor followed so scrupulously with regard to statin therapy first called for an in-depth program to help Jane overcome herContinue reading “RKS Health: Should the Real Goal to be Lower Cholesterol?”

RKS Health: Deadly Profit Seeking

“Sadly, those priorities did not include the safety of Stacey Palmer or all the other tens of thousands of Americans who had suffered cardiovascular complications as a result of taking Vioxx. Many of those injuries and deaths could have been prevented if the New England Journal of Medicine had corrected its erroneous article as soonContinue reading “RKS Health: Deadly Profit Seeking”

RKS Health: Emerging Role of Cannabis for the Seriously Ill: A United States Perspective

As I have certifications in mindfulness and COVID management from Canadian, American and European universities and have written on certain medical topics I receive regular webinar invitations from the MJHS Institute for Innovation in Palliative Care based in New York. MJHS conducts research and offers education and training for health professionals in palliative care. OnContinue reading “RKS Health: Emerging Role of Cannabis for the Seriously Ill: A United States Perspective”