Abbott Doubled Niaspan U.S. Sales Before Trials Cut Use
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Abbott Laboratories aggressively promoted its Niaspan cholesterol treatment, almost tripling U.S. use of the medication, in the seven-year period before studies in 2011 found the drug ineffective, a study found.
From 2002 to 2009, niacin and its brand-name counterpart Niaspan, now sold by Abbott’s spinoff company AbbVie Inc., rose 191 percent in the U.S., to 696,000 prescriptions a month. A combination of assertive marketing and stronger medical guidelines for reducing cholesterol levels drove that increase, according to research published today in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine.