From a Friend of the Blog -- Forbes' Herper -- on the "Statin Showdown" Comparing Statins v. Ezetimibe

[Headline Revised, per the below: "Comparing and Contrasting Statins v. Ezetimibe". . . .]

An occasional guest blogger at Gooznews -- one PM alerted us to the mobile edition (fancy!) of last night's Forbes piece updating the state of the play on statins. Do go read it. It is delivered sans graphics and ads. Nice.

UPDATED -- 07.01.08 @ 6:00 PM EDT: Several developments lead me to float this to the top of the blog.

First, read this reaction, posted over at CafePharma, to the Herper story being pasted-in there by someone:

Forbes article on ezetimibe v. statins

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What's very interesting about this article is I distinctly remember, as do several of my counterparts, a particular cardiologist asking the same thing about Zetia. However, the conversation occurred years ago when I launched Vytorin. In fact, he was my very first call when I began launching the product. I was happy to be launching this new product and was terribly disheartened after my first call in the field with Vytorin. He questioned me about the effect Zetia could have on inflamation and suggested that Zetia could have a negative effect. We had a very long discussion as the cardiologist carefully outlined his concern over lack of data for the Zetia component of Vytorin. Interestingly, I discussed with my manager that this cardiologist was concerned and would not use the product until we have proof that Zetia did NOT have a negative effect on inflamation. In typical manager fashion the eyes rolled and the rant began about how this guy was an idiot and we need to find a way to convince him to use it. Another interesting parallel is the fact that Cordaptive was not approved based on lack of evidence of one component of the combo. HMMMM, makes me question what I do in the field each day. . . .

Well, that war-story is entirely fascinating. Shove the drug into the docs' bags -- don't listen to actual feedback on mechanism of action. "Don't confuse me with any actual facts -- my mind is already made up -- we're positively going to flog this new product -- it's the best thing since sliced bread! -- so that's that. . . ."

Now the second reason, and perhaps more importantly, the real reason for floating, as well as updating, here, is that I have revised -- at PM's astute suggestion -- the title of this post. PM writes:

. . . .The headline to [the Forbes] article doesn't really fit the content of the article. The intent of the piece is to point out that statins have pleiotropic effects, i.e., beneficial effects unrelated to cholesterol lowering. Ezetimibe appears not to have these effects, due to its different mechanism of action. So I was wondering if you could revise your post so it is clear that the article contrasts ezetimibe with statins. . . .

Done. I originally read it -- looking for new information on the marketing of Vytorin -- and saw none. Clearly, PM's eyes are more discerning than mine. Have a safe and happy 4^th, one and all! May be light blogging through the weekend, here. . . .