{"id":8767,"date":"2018-06-07T12:52:20","date_gmt":"2018-06-07T16:52:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/hiv-id-observations\/?p=8767"},"modified":"2018-07-05T06:32:44","modified_gmt":"2018-07-05T10:32:44","slug":"whats-favorite-off-patent-antibiotic-brand-name","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/hiv-id-observations\/index.php\/whats-favorite-off-patent-antibiotic-brand-name\/2018\/06\/07\/","title":{"rendered":"What’s Your Favorite Off-Patent Antibiotic Brand Name?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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National Library of Medicine<\/p><\/div>\n

Each time the FDA approves a new drug, they also approve a new brand name.<\/p>\n

The FDA and other regulators want something safe. They critically want to avoid names that sound or look similar to existing drugs, which could trigger medication errors. And names that imply an ingredient or an action not supported by clinical data are also off-limits.<\/p>\n

But what if you’re a pharmaceutical company? You probably want something snappy and memorable, something that becomes practically synonymous with treatment of the condition. In this review of the drug brand-naming process<\/a>, Prozac<\/em> (for fluoxetine) meets all these criteria perfectly.<\/p>\n

Marketing bliss achieved!<\/a><\/p>\n

To counteract this commercial force, I commonly correct ID fellows, residents, and students when they use brand instead of generic names of antimicrobials.<\/p>\n

Some would call this pointless. Others, pedantic.<\/p>\n

Said no one, ever: Thank you so much, Dr. Sax, for correcting me when I said Z—n instead of piperacillin-tazobactam — or “pip-tazo”, as you seem to be so fond of saying.<\/em><\/p>\n

In compensation for these years of haranguing, I hereby present for your listening pleasure a podcast on antimicrobial brand names. Joining me is the always lively and scintillating Dr. Raphael (Raphy) Landovitz<\/a>, an Associate Professor of Medicine at UCLA and a longtime friend and ID colleague.<\/p>\n

In order to avoid infringing on complicated patent law, we stick with off-patent drugs. And since people get their podcasts from all sorts of places, here are several options:<\/p>\n