New Proposed DTC Advertising Guidelines
On May 27, 2009, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) published a notice soliciting comments on a draft guidance document entitled “Presenting Risk Information in Prescription Drug and Medical Device Promotion.” The draft guidance proposes to use a “reasonable consumer” standard, similar to the Federal Trade Commission's standard, for assessing whether advertisements are misleading, a standard FDA already applies to labels on food and dietary supplements. In the draft guidance, FDA discusses the factors the agency would consider when evaluating prescription drug and restricted device promotional materials directed at healthcare professionals and consumers. The factors include: consistent and appropriate use of language, use of signals, framing of risk information, and the hierarchy of risk information. FDA also states that the agency will review content for both quantity of risk information, as well as materiality and comprehensiveness. Finally, FDA provides extensive factors it considers when evaluating the format of promotional materials. Comments should be submitted by August 25, 2009; for information on submitting comments, click here.
