Join Amazon Prime and ship Two-Day for free and Overnight for $3.99. Already a member? Sign in.
Before You Take that Pill and over 300,000 other books are available for Amazon Kindle – Amazon’s new wireless reading device. Learn more

 

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
 
 
More Buying Choices
67 used & new from $0.04

Have one to sell? Sell yours here
 
   
Before You Take that Pill: Why the Drug Industry May Be Bad for Your Health
 
 
Start reading Before You Take that Pill on your Kindle in under a minute.

Don’t have a Kindle? Get yours here.
 
  

Before You Take that Pill: Why the Drug Industry May Be Bad for Your Health (Paperback)

by J. Douglas Bremner (Author) "Those ominous words, spoken by David J. Graham, M.D., MPH, associate director of drug safety for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), on November..." (more)
Key Phrases: life extension, mini mental status exam, vomiting tendon, Reasons Benign Serious, Allergic Allergy, Orthostatic Heart (more...)
4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)

List Price: $16.95
Price: $11.53 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details
You Save: $5.42 (32%)
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com. Gift-wrap available.

Only 5 left in stock--order soon (more on the way).

Want it delivered Monday, July 13? Choose One-Day Shipping at checkout. Details
36 new from $2.78 31 used from $0.04
Also Available in: List Price: Our Price: Other Offers:
Kindle Edition (Kindle Book) $9.99
Paperback (Bargain Price) $16.95 $4.93 15 used & new from $4.46

Frequently Bought Together

Before You Take that Pill: Why the Drug Industry May Be Bad for Your Health + Our Daily Meds: How the Pharmaceutical Companies Transformed Themselves into Slick Marketing Machines and Hooked the Nation on Prescription Drugs + Overtreated: Why Too Much Medicine Is Making Us Sicker and Poorer
Price For All Three: $33.29

Show availability and shipping details


Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought

Overtreated: Why Too Much Medicine Is Making Us Sicker and Poorer

Overtreated: Why Too Much Medicine Is Making Us Sicker and Poorer

by Shannon Brownlee
4.4 out of 5 stars (27)  $10.88
Selling Sickness: How the World's Biggest Pharmaceutical Companies Are Turning Us All Into Patients

Selling Sickness: How the World's Biggest Pharmaceutical Companies Are Turning Us All Into Patients

by Ray Moynihan
4.3 out of 5 stars (26)  $12.44
The Truth About the Drug Companies: How They Deceive Us and What to Do About It

The Truth About the Drug Companies: How They Deceive Us and What to Do About It

by Marcia Angell
3.9 out of 5 stars (89)  $10.85
Your Body's Red Light Warning Signals, revised edition: Medical Tips That May Save Your Life

Your Body's Red Light Warning Signals, revised edition: Medical Tips That May Save Your Life

by Neil Shulman
5.0 out of 5 stars (1)  $7.99
Generation Rx: How Prescription Drugs Are Altering American Lives, Minds, and Bodies

Generation Rx: How Prescription Drugs Are Altering American Lives, Minds, and Bodies

by Greg Critser
3.6 out of 5 stars (10)  $10.17
Explore similar items

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
A medical expert reveals risks of the most commonly prescribed drugs-and why the drug industry doesn't want consumers to know about them.

Recent scandals involving diabetes drugs, Vioxx, and many other medications reveal the serious and undisclosed risks of some of the most commonly used prescription drugs in this country. In Before You Take That Pill, Dr. J. Douglas Bremner, a researcher and clinician at Emory University whose study on Accutane and depression made headlines, offers an inside look at the pharmaceutical industry, as well as a scientifically backed assessment of the risks of more than three hundred prescribed medications, vitamins, and supplements.

While many drugs are essential to the health of consumers, as Dr. Bremner explains, for many people, the benefits may not outweigh the potential side effects. This book contains warnings that are not on the drug labels. It also exposes tricks of the trade that demonstrate how the profit-making interests of "big pharma" may not always be in line with the safety of the public - from the corruption that exists in the drug approval process to the tactics drug companies use to encourage doctors to prescribe their products. Most important, Before You Take That Pill empowers readers by giving them sound information on specific medications so they can understand and weigh the potential risk themselves. Backed by the latest studies, as well as insight from a doctor who is in the trenches, this book should be on the shelf of every drug consumer.

About the Author
J. Douglas Bremner, M.D., is a researcher and physician at Emory University School of Medicine. Currently a professor of psychiatry and radiology, he is also the director of the Emory Clinical Neuroscience Research Unit and the director of Mental Health Research at the Atlanta VA Medical Center. His research on Accutane and depression was highly publicized and featured in USA Today. He lives in Atlanta, Georgia.

Product Details

  • Paperback: 448 pages
  • Publisher: Avery Trade; illustrated edition edition (February 28, 2008)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 1583332952
  • ISBN-13: 978-1583332955
  • Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.2 x 1.3 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.com Sales Rank: #49,376 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

    #9 in  Books > Health, Mind & Body > Aging > Osteoporosis
    #28 in  Books > Health, Mind & Body > Alternative Medicine > Supplements

Inside This Book (learn more)
First Sentence:
Those ominous words, spoken by David J. Graham, M.D., MPH, associate director of drug safety for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), on November 18, 2004, were part of congressional testimony concerning the dangers of the arthritis medication Vioxx, which had just been taken off the market because of evidence that it increased the risk of heart attack. Read the first page
Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
life extension, mini mental status exam, vomiting tendon, trouble hypotension, slurred disease, rhabdomyolysis pregnancy, glucose tensives, male sexual thinking, ommended characteristics, complaints esophagitis, respiratory elevations, hypersensitivity feeding, kidney headache, stroke palpitations, death weight gain, tension rash, driving addictions, weight loss numbness, kidney ulcers, viral infection pregnancy, tension diarrhea, vomiting impairment, muscle liver damage, ment dysmenorrhea, arthritis nausea
Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Reasons Benign Serious, Allergic Allergy, Orthostatic Heart, New York Times, Alternative Medicines, The Bottom Line, Women's Health Initiative, Side Effects, Decreased Suicidal Allergic, African Americans, Pregnancy Headaches, Stomach Diarrhea, None None, Allergy Sleepiness, National Institutes of Health, British Medical Journal, Hamilton Depression Scale, The Lancet, Growth Seizures, Drug Use Common, Increased Heart, Upper Potassium Pregnancy, Blood Heart Heart, Recommended Daily Allowance, North America
Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
Search Inside This Book:


Tags Customers Associate with This Product

 (What's this?)
Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
Check the boxes next to the tags you consider relevant or enter your own tags in the field below.
(1)
(1)

Your tags: Add your first tag
 
Help others find this product — tag it for Amazon search
J. Douglas Bremner suggested this product show on searches for "diabetes". What do you suggest?

 

Customer Reviews

8 Reviews
5 star:
 (7)
4 star:    (0)
3 star:    (0)
2 star:    (0)
1 star:
 (1)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.5 out of 5 stars (8 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
Share your thoughts with other customers:
Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Wake Up America and the World!, March 10, 2008
This book is a must read! Doug Bremner has researched and applied an unbiased, fact based approach to the many questions we as consumers have with the drug mania around us today. His writing technique is witty and spellbinding! I will think twice for myself, as well as for my family and friends, about accepting prescribed drugs BEFORE exploring possible harmful adverse effects and most importantly healthy alternative options!
Comment Comment (1) | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)



 
15 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Four out of five doctors recommend..., April 10, 2008
By Steven Rhodes (Atlanta, GA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
But which doctors are these? Unfortunately, it turns out in many cases, these four doctors also happen to be on said product's payroll. Even when conflict of interest is not quite so clear cut, specific and serious problems exist in the way drugs reach the U.S. public. Doug Bremner provides a frightening indictment of a broken system.

Chapter one provides a quick overview of the scope of the problem, placing it in an historic perspective. It describes how we have arrived at the current drug approval methods and the troublesomely cozy relationship between corporations and regulators. It briefly discusses the impact of profit driven drug development, and aggressive marketing. Although first chapter has no end-notes (following chapters do), it does reference a number of books and of investigative journalism articles.

Wonderfully written in clear non-technical language and organized by diagnosed condition, the remaining invaluable chapters provide detailed examples of the results of this broken system. In his introduction, Dr. Bremner states that this book is not a reference. In that it is not an exhaustive listing of all current drugs and their side effects that is true. However: being so cleanly organized well indexed, and providing many specifically justified recommendations, Before You Take that Pill should be an important home reference for U.S. health care consumers.

A final critical note: it is both stated by the author and clear throughout that the book is not intended as anti-pharmaceutical. It is rather, to provide consumers with the information needed to make more fully informed decisions as to the risks and benefits of certain treatment options.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)



 
12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Much Needed, March 6, 2008
This is right on time, with all the toxic drugs that don't work well today.

Should be required reading for all medical, nursing & pharmacy students.

Highly recommeded !

Charles Whitfield MD, author, The Truth about Mental Illness
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)


Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
 
 
 
Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars a necessary book
now that every other commercial on television is urging us to "talk to your doctor about" and dispensing marketing disguised as bogus medical advice, we need objective information... Read more
Published 4 days ago by Carolyn

5.0 out of 5 stars A Must Read
Anyone and everyone taking scripts should read this book.
Very important info for everyone.
Published 1 month ago by Gayle Alexia

5.0 out of 5 stars Take responsibility for your own health
Hi! This book is well written, well researched and VERY informative. Just because a doctor prescribes something to treat your illness doesn't mean it's good for you or that their... Read more
Published 9 months ago by Christine Bean

5.0 out of 5 stars If you take responsibility for your own health, buy this book.
Must have for the home library. I use mine all the time at work (I am an RN in a VA hospital), but the first drugs I looked up were the ones my mom and dad were taking. Read more
Published 13 months ago by Kathryn

1.0 out of 5 stars A thousand thumbs down for this book !!!
This book is nothing but a person's rage against Roche, because they didn't want to cooperate with Dr. Read more
Published 13 months ago by J. Aragon

Only search this product's reviews



Customer Discussions

 Beta (What's this?)
New! See all customer communities, and bookmark your communities to keep track of them.
This product's forum (1 discussion)
  Discussion Replies Latest Post
Should people educate themselves about health and their meds? 1 May 2008
See all discussions...  
Start a new discussion
Topic:
First post:
Prompts for sign-in
  [Cancel]


   


Product Information from the Amapedia Community

Beta (What's this?)



Look for Similar Items by Category


Free Songs, Cheap Albums
Special MP3 Deals
Visit our Special Deals Store to find ultra-low prices on great albums, daily deals, and over 500 free songs.

Shop now

 

Best Books of 2008

Best of 2008
Find our top 100 editors' picks as well as customers' favorites in dozens of categories in our Best Books of 2008 Store.
 

Buy Three Books, Get a Fourth Free

4-for-3 Books
Order any four eligible books under $10 and get the lowest-price book free in our 4-for-3 Books Store. See more details.
 

Ridgid Professional Tools

Shop for Ridgid tools
Known as industry-leading products that allow professionals to operate in extreme conditions, Ridgid tools perform reliably day in and day out.

Shop for Ridgid tools

 

 

Feedback

If you need help or have a question for Customer Service, contact us.
 Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
Is there any other feedback you would like to provide?

Your comments can help make our site better for everyone.


Where's My Stuff?

Shipping & Returns

Need Help?

Your Recent History

  (What's this?)
You have no recently viewed items or searches.

After viewing product detail pages or search results, look here to find an easy way to navigate back to pages you are interested in.

Look to the right column to find helpful suggestions for your shopping session.

Continue shopping: Top Sellers

Conditions of Use | Privacy Notice © 1996-2009, Amazon.com, Inc. or its affiliates