There is no doubt that prescription medications contain very effective treatments. Many conditions that couldn’t be dealt with at all now are treatable and oftentimes completely eliminated with the proper use of applied medical therapy. No one of serious scientific background is disputing the fact that Reglan works to control acid reflux and nausea in cases where other drugs have failed. The problem comes in that the manufacturers and marketers have been less than forthright about the medicine’s consequences and side effects.
The real cost of this kind of attitude goes beyond the simple financial or personal damage done as a result. Even once settlements are made and patients have gone on with their lives, you have sites like this (link) popping up. Notice the statement the site makes about band-aids and medicines unable to treat the underlying condition. There’s an interesting point to be made there, but in a different direction than this site suggests.
GERD is a difficult condition to treat. Reglan is prescribed as a last resort, when other medicines, such as proton pump inhibitors, don’t work as effectively as intended. This is not a case of doctors trying to line their pockets, but a genuine case where our medical knowledge simply doesn’t extend to the realm of curing the condition, and can only go as far as treating and managing it for the time being.
However, the reluctance of medical companies to be honest and forthright about the conditions of their medicines and the limitations those medicines operate under gives sites like this room to grow, and allows false opinion to take root. Ultimately, this lack of honesty and the ignorance that results from it allows untested and potentially fruitless advice to take root in its place. In the long run, this causes just as much damage as putting inadequately tested drugs onto the market.
