Roche sponsor early breast cancer leaflet
pharmafile | November 10, 2006 | News story | Medical Communications |
Roche is backing a new leaflet designed to help patients with newly diagnosed early breast cancer make sense of the treatment options available to them.
Ask About Medicines For Your Primary (Early) Breast Cancer is produced by charity Breast Cancer Care and suggests a series of questions for patients to ask their doctor.
The leaflet includes sections on chemotherapy, hormonal therapy and targeted therapy, but Roche's Herceptin is the only drug to be mentioned by name in the leaflet.
The drug was approved earlier this year as a treatment for early breast cancer and the pharma company provided an unrestricted educational grant for the leaflet, which was produced as part of the annual Ask About Medicines Week campaign.
The annual patient information campaign runs from 6-10 November and this year's theme encouraged the elderly, up to 50% of whom are may not be taking their medicines as intended, to ask about their medicines.
Four fifths of people over the age of 75 are taking at least one prescribed medicine and 36% of people aged 75 and over take four or more prescribed drugs.
Now in its fourth year, Ask About Medicines Week is run by independent charity Ask About Medicines to increase the involvement of patients and carers in decisions about their medicines.
The charity works with a broad coalition of organisations drawn from government, the NHS, patient groups and the pharmaceutical industry.
Pharma support has also come from Merck Sharp & Dohme. The company is providing at least 20 grants of up to £1,000 each to support groups wanting to partner the charity for on-going Ask About Medicines activities.
Another strand to the campaign is Ask About Antibiotics, an initiative produced by the RPSGB in conjunction with the Department of Health and the Health Protection Agency.
RPSGB president Hemant Patel said: "There is still a great deal of misunderstanding about antibiotics with many people believing that they can be taken to combat viral infections such as colds and flu.
"We hope that this campaign will help to inform people about the most appropriate use of antibiotics and help fight antibiotic resistance."
Ask About Medicines has produced a range of pdf posters, action packs for healthcare professionals and voluntary health organisations and a PR tool-kit containing instructions on how to organise a media campaign.
Also being made available are its credit-card sized, fold-out medicines charts, produced with sponsorship from the Department of Health.
The Department itself recently started piloting information prescriptions for patients with long-term medical conditions, such as cancer or mental health problems, as part of its commitment to help patients help themselves.
Next year, the theme for Ask About Medicines Week will be children and young people.
