cancer and critical care drug shortage

[RoadToad]

I should give the rest of the story. They gave her Dilaudid for the headache, which got it down to where she could function, and the Compazine was going to be for the nausea associated with that. With that unavailable, she got the old reliable Phenergan, which she's taken before with success, and that worked. She's also had a CT scan and MRI, and we're still waiting for the results of the latter. Last time she had a migraine was when she was pregnant, and my stepson is 23 (no, she's not, she's had a hysterectomy). Gills, she does have a prescription for Sumatriptan, which I happen to take myself (I have a seizure disorder and migraines), and is the generic for Imitrex, but the problem is, you have to take that at the very onset of a headache for it to be effective, and she's had this same headache continuously for weeks now, so the Sumatriptan does very little. Personally, I say that with unexplained migraines that have been going on for weeks, she needs to see a neurologist. Her doctor says that's "jumping the gun," since we don't have the results of the MRI yet. I say that's bull, no matter WHAT those results are, she needs a neurologist, and the only reason I haven't scheduled an appointment myself is that I don't want to alienate this doctor that my wife likes a lot. But I'm not going to wait much longer.

Sorry to highjack a thread..

[Chubminnow]

Listening to NPR today, found out that some critical care injectable drugs are in very short supply. These are the expensive super new drugs, they are the old stand bys. Why? No profit.

I wonder if that's NO profit or just not the kind of profit the drug companies like seeing? Medicine has seemed to me to be ridiculously sky high for a very VERY long time. Not that I take any worth talking about, but I've seen what my parents have had to pay over the years. All I can say is Lord help us all when we get ill or a little older.

[bassin_bug]

I wonder if that's NO profit or just not the kind of profit the drug companies like seeing? Medicine has seemed to me to be ridiculously sky high for a very VERY long time. Not that I take any worth talking about, but I've seen what my parents have had to pay over the years. All I can say is Lord help us all when we get ill or a little older.

I have a cousin, in his late 30s, who suffers from a rare type of arthritis and requires a special injectable medication that costs $4k per vial which lasts one month. If he doesn't get it, he suffers incredible pain and gets so he is unable to move enough to get up and go to work. He said that his doctor has been unable to find any for him anywhere for this month. He also said he is really scared and the doctor told him he is extremely concerned because the medicine is already in such short supply and laid blame on the pharmaceutical companies.

One of the best and most popular cancer treatment medications is almost out of existence because the manufacturer said they either had, or will soon, stop making it because it is just too expensive to make. I guess things have about reached the point at which a cancer patient will just be allowed to die because their life is no longer valued.