Brit Paxil/Seroxat Activist Meets With Brit FDA, Gets Concessions

Many of you know Bob Fiddman who writes the Seroxat Sufferers blog in the UK. Seroxat is the UK name for Paxil. Fiddy was utterly ripped apart by the drug and especially by his withdrawal from it, and for the last few years he's been hounding GlaxoSmithKline, the drug's maker, and the MHRA, Britain's FDA over why the drug is still on the market and why it's still on the market with almost no information about withdrawal issues with the drug. He's not the only activist in the UK to have taken their frustrations with both parties online--oddly, in the US there is much less anger directed at Paxil than in the UK, for reasons I really cannot account for--but he's the one who got the attention of the MHRA's chief Prof. Kent Woods.

Last week, Fiddman had a sit-down with Woods and has posted the minutes of their meeting online. Fiddaman got some results from his meeting: the MHRA has agreed to meet with David Healy, a British psychiatrist and vocal critic of SSRIs, and presumably Healy will provide the agency will all sorts of information about Paxil and its problems. What's more, the MHRA will work with the British physician formulary--kind of like their Merck drug guide I suppose--to include information on withdrawal from Paxil/Seroxat.

This is a substantial victory for Fidders, a man of many cognomens, and I congratulate him. It's of course a victory for all of us in a way.

Most especially, however, I wish to thank Prof. Woods and the MHRA for meeting with Fiddaman. Would that our own FDA would be as forthcoming with patients on this side of the Atlantic who have similar concerns and inquiries about various drugs and the agency's role in making up psychiatric diagnoses on its own.

In the near future, I will be able to offer you all some interesting evidence of just how influential websites like this one, and Fiddaman's and some of yours have become when it comes to matters concerning certain psych meds. This evidence will also show how comparatively weak is the influence of various health care websites such as WebMD and how the bloggers are now almost as influential as such traditional media powerhouses as the BBC and the New York Times. I cannot wait until the FDA sees that evidence.