Does FDA Approval Make Fibromyalgia Treatments More Available?
Does FDA Approval Make Fibromyalgia Treatments More Available? Tuesday August 5, 2008 #spacer{clear:left}#abc #sidebar{margin-top:1.5em}zSB(3,3) We now have two drugs FDA approved as fibromyalgia treatments – Lyrica (pregabalin) and Cymbalta (duloxetine) – but what does that official FDA stamp mean for you? Anything? It’s not really a question of access. Before their approvals, doctors widely prescribed both Lyrica and Cymbalta for fibromyalgia, just as they still give us, off-label, an array of medications. It’s more a question of money, as FDA approval makes drug companies more likely to cover the cost of a medication. Notice I said “more likely” – they don’t have to, and many of them don’t. More than a year after Lyrica’s much-heralded approval, a lot of people still can’t get their
