I have a chronic migraine that is primarily triggered by stress and presents as sinus pressure, followed by what feels like a sinus headache.
I’ve known for over 15 years that phenylephedrine is ineffective as a treatment for my sinus pressure. Incidentally, every single doctor I have talked to has also confirmed that phenylephedrine was completely useless - sometimes moments after recommending it - once I push back against it. Every pharmacy tech and pharmacist recommends the stuff, too.(It’s fine now. We figured it out a few years ago, and got me on a preventative migraine medicine that has changed my life.)
But I say all that because recently I traveled to Iceland and found myself in need of cold medicine. It was a challenge, as a U.S. citizen. I didn’t understand they don’t have pharmacy aisles in grocery stores there where you pick from dozens or hundreds of options full of advertising speak.
Once I figured out you had to go to either a pharmacy or a chemist, it was easy. You go in, tell a person what you need or what your symptoms are, and this person works with you to find the right ting. They tell you the dosage, and sell you the medicine (which also has dosage information). Or they tell you to go to a proper doctor or hospital.It was a shocking and eye-opening experience to me. It made me realize that in the U.S. we’re treated as if we’re consumers, even in our times of (sometimes desperate) need. There’s no care, no consideration, no actual human-focused effort for helping people.
From the top down, we’re treated as chattel, to be exploited and mislead. Bilked out of our money and health.But but but… Socialism is bad. /s
When I travelled to the states I was absolutely horrified to find medications for things that only a doctor should prescribe being recommend directly to consumers “Speak to your doctor about X today!”
We have ads for heartburn meds and simple painkillers, but to see immunosuppressants and diabetes treatments marketed to consumers is shocking and absolutely will drive poorer outcomes for patients as they try and force the issue with their GP without the medical beckground to understand the effecacy of that medicine.
And people wonder why the U.S. spends more money on healthcare with lower health outcomes.
I only remember it becoming popular when pseudoephedrine was taken off the shelf, because war on drugs.
Roughly two decades ago, oral phenylephrine began proliferating on pharmacy shelves despite mounting—and now damning—evidence that the drug simply does not work.
“It has been an open secret among pharmacists,” says Randy Hatton, a pharmacy professor at the University of Florida, who filed a citizen petition in 2007 and again in 2015 asking the FDA to reevaluate phenylephrine. This week, an advisory panel to the FDA voted 16–0 that the drug is ineffective orally, which could pave the way for the agency to finally pull the drug.
If so, the impact would be huge. Phenylephrine is combined with fever reducers, cough suppressants, or antihistamines in many popular multidrug products such as the aforementioned DayQuil. Americans collectively shell out $1.763 billion a year for cold and allergy meds with phenylephrine, according to the FDA, which also calls the number a likely underestimate. That’s a lot of money for a decongestant that, again, does not work.
Thanks a lot, meth.
