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Biotech / Medical : Agouron Pharmaceuticals (AGPH) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Oliver & Co who wrote (2781)	11/14/1997 1:49:00 AM
From: JOHN W.	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 6136

<The best patient is the informed patient, but in todays medicine, resources are scarcer every day, maybe they should have put in the guidelines that before you give a prescription to a patient, you, or your staff has to be sure the patient understands,and agrees with the treatment, and a "Dry Run" is performed.> I agree with this statement. That being said, a related concern I have with a discussion of patient compliance is that Doctors are deliberately withholding the best treatment available to patients based on their evaluation of whether that patient will not be compliant with the regimen. Although, this is certainly still in the best interest of the patient they are treating, what criteria is used to make this determination. Is it psycological, sociological, or medical. If 2 patients see the same doctor with the same state of virus and same treatment history (naive), would one get the triple cocktail and thhe other not, or worse would one simply not get the PI. For instance, if one was a caucasian investment banker, wealthy, and seemed very responsible and has everything to live for be deemed able to be compliant while the IV drug user that is unemployed be deemed not able to be compliant. My point is, regardless on who pays for the treatment, a certain condundrum/dicrimination may persist. since the cost of these drugs is so high, I believe it provides an incentive for ADAPS, insurance companies, HMOs to withhold the best treatments until a patient gets sick using vague medical reasonong. eveyone should be able to get the best treatment available at the appropriate time merely based on bio-medical evidence alone. I hardly think that the doctor who withholds prescibing the triple therapy based on adherence, would himself take the triple therapy if it was him that became infected, and would start the therapy the same day he discovered he was positive.