Hippocrates is considered the father of medicine, enemy of superstition, pioneer of rationality and fount of eternal wisdom. Statues and drawings show him with a furrowed brow, thinking hard about how…
It can take 12 years and more than £1 billion to create a new medicine. But when we swallow a capsule, squeeze those eye drops or administer an injection, we rarely stop to think about the work that has…
The call to abolish the prescription charge in England by the Drug and Therapeutics Bulletin is the centre of great debate. Unsurprisingly so. The cost of making and buying pharmaceutical drugs is an emotive…
Commonly used over-the-counter painkillers such as paracetamol, aspirin and ibuprofen will usually be strong enough to alleviate common aches and pains. But if you’re suffering from acute pain from dental…
Pfizer is like Woody Allen’s famous shark. It has to keep moving or it will die. And the drug company seems unable to keep moving by any means other than acquisitions. Its all-time best-selling drug, Lipitor…
It has been 12 years since Botox was approved for the treatment of wrinkles. Botulinum toxin, one of the most potent toxins in nature, is also used to treat a number of health problems from neck spasms…
It was late on a Friday afternoon in November. I was a 21 year-old medical student diligently waiting for an opportunity to practice some medical procedures when a patient was admitted who was happy for…
A new study has found a link between the amount of sodium in certain medications and the risk of cardiovascular problems, including hypertension and stroke – and says normal use of some medicines can expose…
This year’s Ig Nobel prizes were awarded on September 12 at a meeting of nerds at Harvard University. The prizes are given for genuine scientific research that “first makes people laugh and then makes…
Bacteria in the human gut, which are present in the billions, can change the effect of medicine. This has been demonstrated for at least 40 drugs. But, until now, nobody knew exactly how. New research…
Gone are the good old days when medicines had simple, easy to pronounce names such as aspirin, paracetamol and morphine. Nowadays pharmaceutical companies almost seem to revel in giving drugs names that…
Ten percent of the world consumes 90% of the morphine. At first glance that’s just another statistic about haves and have nots. But it’s more stark than that - particularly if you have cancer in a country…
It’s not a thought that occurs to most of us, but flushing the toilet doesn’t just mean disposing of our bodily waste. We’re also flushing away some of the medicine we take down with it. Our contraceptive…
Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis this week lost a seven-year legal battle over a drug patent in India. It’s certainly a win for those in India who use the drug, and for patients in India more generally…
The earthquake in the Northern Italian town of Medolla this May devastated the local community, killing 17 people and leaving 14,000 homeless. Because Medolla is the manufacturing epicentre of the Italian…
Pharmaceutical companies will be required to disclose more details about their financial ties to doctors under a revised self-regulatory code, but they have resisted calls to name doctors individually…
The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) 2011 - Twitter hashtag #ACTA - is a controversial trade agreement designed to provide for stronger enforcement of intellectual property rights. There’s been…