by Teresa Weimer

Created on: October 27, 2009

I've learned from my own experience working in the pharmaceutical industry that health care is not an industry dedicated to healing the sick. It's "Big Business" driven by profits using our health as its commodity. Perhaps our confusion begins when we blindly put our faith and trust into medical professionals that we thought were driven by compassion to heal. Our gullible hearts want to think of our good doctors as noble healers and wise medicine men rather than shrewd business entrepreneurs.

The reality is more medical doctors choose their profession based on the promise of wealth. They hope to achieve greater status by earning prestige and notoriety rather than being selfless humanitarians dedicated to curing the ailing. Too many are driven by a greater desire to line their pockets with green and gold rather than fill their hearts by assisting the ill. This has never been more true than when it comes to the "pay to prescribe" mentality of "Big Pharma".

Doctors are heavily solicited by an endless stream of pharmaceuticals sales reps touting their goods offering highly enticing incentives to doctors willing to prescribe their drugs. The pharmaceutical industry is a multibillion dollar machine offering generous financial rewards, palatable perks and bonuses to doctors that write a certain number of prescriptions each and every month. Doctors may choose to prescribe certain medications for no other reason than it benefits their bottom line. The incentives in turn encourage doctors to prescribe drugs to patients that they don't really need for conditions they don't actually have.

I recently saw a doctor for a suspected hernia. I was confused when he prescribed a drug used for managing acid reflux. I consulted a local pharmacist about the prescription choice asking what acid reflux medication had to do with helping symptoms of a hernia. He replied "nothing". I had a similar experience with another doctor I saw for a slight breathing problem. He prescribed an acid reflux medication along with an anti depressant. After doing some research on my own, I called the doctor questioning his choice of meds based on my symptoms. He seemed offended by my call, but offered the response that he prescribed those drugs in order to "rule" out certain possibilities. Silly me, I thought I was visiting the doctor for his expertise and the shortest path to treat my symptoms not to participate in an impromptu drug study or experimental diagnosis of a rather common ailment with a known

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