Generic Medicine Guide USA

A few weeks ago I sat down with a small pile of patient information leaflets and printed product sheets for generic tadalafil tablets. Tadacip, Vidalista, Tadalista, Ciasel and a couple of others. My goal was simple: work out what actually differs between them, and what is just packaging. These are the notes I wish I had read first. The active ingredient is the same, and that is the point Every one of these products contains tadalafil, the same molecule sold in the US, UK and Europe under the original brand name Cialis. Tadalafil is a PDE5 inhibitor. It is prescribed for erectile dysfunction, and at a low daily dose it is also used for the urinary symptoms of an enlarged prostate. The brand names are simply trade names chosen by each manufacturer. Tadacip is made by Cipla. Vidalista is made by Centurion Laboratories. Tadalista comes from Fortune Healthcare. Other names on the shelf come from other generic manufacturers. Once you look past the box design, the first line of every leaflet...

The hardest part of treating hair loss with finasteride is not swallowing a tablet once a day. It is waiting. Many people stop in the first few months because nothing seems to be happening, or because things seem to get worse before they get better. Knowing roughly what to expect, month by month, makes it much easier to give the medicine a fair trial. Everything below assumes finasteride 1 mg once a day, which is the licensed dose for male pattern hair loss, prescribed by a doctor who has confirmed that this is the type of hair loss you have. Months 1 to 3: quiet changes under the surface Finasteride works by lowering levels of dihydrotestosterone (DHT), a hormone that gradually shrinks hair follicles in people who are genetically prone to male pattern baldness. DHT levels start to fall within days of the first tablet, but hair grows slowly, so you will not see that in the mirror yet. Some people notice extra hairs on the pillow or in the shower during this stage. This is often describ...

Imatinib changed the outlook for chronic myeloid leukaemia (CML) when it arrived around the turn of the century. It turned a disease that was often fatal into one that many people now manage for years with a daily tablet. It is also used for gastrointestinal stromal tumours (GIST) and some other cancers. The catch, for a long time, was cost. Generic imatinib is often far cheaper than the original brand, and it is fair to ask why, and whether anything important changes along the way. Patents and why prices drop The original imatinib product was developed by Novartis and sold as Glivec in Europe and Gleevec in the United States. Like most new medicines, it was protected by patents, which gave the company exclusive rights to sell it for a set period. During that time there was no direct competition, and the price reflected that. Once patents expire or are not granted in a given country, other manufacturers can make the same medicine. They do not have to repeat the large clinical trials th...

Searching for a cheaper source of a regular prescription can quickly lead you to pharmacies in other countries. Some are well run. Others are not pharmacies at all, just websites selling tablets of unknown origin. Before handing over a prescription, payment details or your medical history, it is worth running through a short set of checks. None of them take long, and together they filter out most of the obvious problems. Check 1: Does it ask for a valid prescription? This is the single clearest signal. A pharmacy supplying prescription-only medicines should ask for a prescription written by a licensed prescriber, and it should actually check it. If a site offers to send prescription medicines with no prescription, or replaces one with a quick tick-box questionnaire, treat that as a warning, not a convenience. A prescription is not just paperwork. It means a clinician has considered your other medicines, your health conditions and the right dose for you. Skipping that step removes the m...