The FDA has also approved the drugs Cymbalta and Savella to treat fibromyalgia in individuals over age eighteen.
Gail Cawkwell is a rheumatologist who treats children and young people with arthritis and fibromyalgia. She is also a Vice President at Pfizer. Doctor Cawkwell told VOA that fibromyalgia is a very mysterious disease that has proved difficult to diagnose and treat. She says Pfizer believes Lyrica helps doctors ease their patients’ pain and other symptoms.
“Lyrica’s primary effect we believe is on pain, we believe is on calming down excited nerves, and its impact on fibromyalgia overall is there beyond just the pain of fibromyalgia.”
Doctor Cawkwell says she has treated thousands of fibromyalgia patients in the past fifteen years. She says that, with good medicines, doctors can make a real difference in the lives of people with fibromyalgia. She says patients make an effort to find out what is happening in the body and how to get better.
But she notes that people can be healthy one day and the next day wake up feeling tired and everything hurts. And, she adds, the disease can last many years, even a lifetime.
Lyrica is an important product for Pfizer. In two thousand ten, the drug produced three billion dollars in sales worldwide. Doctor Cawkwell says Pfizer is studying patients with fibromyalgia in China and Japan. And she says the company is looking at what she calls “bio-markers” in people with fibromyalgia. Bio-markers help researchers know what is happening in the bodies of people with a disease or medical condition. Doctor Cawkwell says it is important to find bio-markers for fibromyalgia.
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2013-11-25
2013-11-25
2013-11-25
2013-11-25
2013-11-25
2013-11-25