Does direct to consumer advertising, allowed in the United States but not in Canada, have an effect on prescribing? The study from California’s Western University of Health Sciences in partnership with Ontario’s Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (ICES) and Yale University in Connecticut was published in The New England Journal of Medicine on March 30, 2008 and demonstrates differences between the US in Canada with respect to the use of the drug.

• Dr. Cynthia Jackevicius, Pharm.D., M.Sc. University Health Network and the Department of Health Policy, Faculty of Medicine at University of Toronto and Department of Pharmacy Practice and Administration, Western University of Health Sciences, Pomona, CA and ICES scientist.