Healthcare and drug (as in medicines) issues here are for all to know/see/hear.
Maybe it happens back home but I don’t remember the public being so informed/involved.
So far we’ve been through issues with levothyroxine (patients experiencing side effects after the reformulation), script charges (came out in the papers saying HawkesBay’s pharmacies charging too much!), hospital scripts to be able to code “4′s” and now it’s something to do with a pharmaceutical company’s manufacturing site (Ranbaxy’s Lovir, Amoxycillin and Cefaclor – Medsafe considering a ban)
This would mean we would all need to be updated (thus me in front of the telly watching NEWS at 6pm!) because you’re bound to get people asking you about it the next day – whether in person or through the phone.
Then hor…I’m made confused by these people using eltroxin=levothyroxine. Isn’t Eltroxin the brand name from GSK?
You know how medicines have their brand name and then the generic in smaller print? Well, the imported levothyroxine that we got for one of the patient last month had the brand and “Eltroxin” at the bottom of the brand name. Pelik, kan?
Even if Eltroxin was part of the brand name, is that possible? I thought the name is a registered trademark?
*shrugs*
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
In most of the world GSK have the rights to the Eltroxin name. (At least, until they flogged them to Aspen.) But, for reasons I do not know, in the UK Goldshield have the marketing rights.
Some UK (i.e. Goldshield) Eltroxin is being (or has been) shipped to NZ. Hence there were simultaneously GSK *and* Goldshield versions. In the circumstances, I’d guess it is likely that GSK will not object. After all, Goldshield are not attempting to market their Eltroxin – merely temporarily fill a gap.
polygonum: so much about trademark.