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Mike Mitka

JAMA. 2007;297:939-940.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

Advertisements of prescription drugs on television offer limited educational value and may oversell the products in ways that could conflict with promoting population health, said researchers in a research report released on January 29.

The study's authors, led by Dominick L. Frosch, PhD, assistant professor of medicine at the University of California Los Angeles David Geffen School of Medicine, concluded that drug ads on television offer limited information about disease causes and about who is at risk; show actors losing control over their social, emotional, or physical lives without medication; and minimize health benefits of lifestyle modification (Frosch DL et al. Ann Fam Med. 2007;5:6-13).

A new study concludes that television ads for prescription drugs offer limited educational value and use emotional appeals to suggest to consumers that a medication would help them regain control over some aspect of life.

"You see patterns in these ads," Frosch said. . . . [Full Text of this Article]