Pink Pills and Blue Pills
Lidia Wasowicz, in a report on non-drug depression treatments for United Press International, quotes Jill Becker's complaint about many depression drug trials: In fact, most drug trials are designed to include both men and women, but do not include a large enough number of subjects to determine if there are differences between males and females in drug effectiveness.
Becker's work with rats has uncovered several interesting reactions between drugs and sex hormones. She suggests that this not only affects whether a treatment will be effective on both men and women, but also on whether it will be effective in adolescents, who have different hormonal balances than their adult counterparts.
She's not the only one worried. A 1995 review by Harris, Benet and Schwartz expressed concern over the lack of research into sex-differentiated reactions. In addition to the metabolism differences for various drugs, there are also gender specific health concerns to consider, such as pregnancy, menopause, and birth control hormone treatments. It's well-known that antibiotics can suppress the efficacy of birth control pills, but other effects, such as the reduction of drug absorption due to menopause, are less broadly known. Hormonal levels can have a distinct effect on drug reaction, and vice versa.
Drici and Clément (2001) suggest a couple of alternative explanations to some gender-differentiated reactions. They suggest that perhaps women's tendency to visit the doctor more frequently than men may have an effect, in that women may be on more medications (polypharmacy) than men, leading to more drug interactions. They also suggest that in cases of subjective assessment, women may be interpreting their symptoms differently than equivalent reactions in men.
Do drug testing protocols need a complete overhaul to examine the differences in male and female reactions? Is this comparable to the BiDil case, a drug that tested as only being effective in blacks? As Taylor and Ellis point out in their 2002 review, "racial categorization acts as only a surrogate marker ... any identified differences will not apply to all members of each stratified group." Another concern is the relaxed attitude in health industry toward female health. If different drugs are developed for men and women, will as much emphasis be put on the development of each?
I haven't noticed any difference in my response to drugs since transition, but since I'm in relatively good health, my experience with drugs is very limited. It seems like everyone I know has a "non-standard" reaction to one drug or another. I become giddy, rather than calm or sleepy, on most opiates (e.g. Percoset, Vicodin, codeine). I worry about the divisive effects of splitting people into medical categories, but that's largely a product of the society I function in. A society that didn't see differences as necessarily divisive (or ranked) might be more able to use our legitimate physical differences to aid in research and care, without costing anyone their humanity.
Becker's work with rats has uncovered several interesting reactions between drugs and sex hormones. She suggests that this not only affects whether a treatment will be effective on both men and women, but also on whether it will be effective in adolescents, who have different hormonal balances than their adult counterparts.
She's not the only one worried. A 1995 review by Harris, Benet and Schwartz expressed concern over the lack of research into sex-differentiated reactions. In addition to the metabolism differences for various drugs, there are also gender specific health concerns to consider, such as pregnancy, menopause, and birth control hormone treatments. It's well-known that antibiotics can suppress the efficacy of birth control pills, but other effects, such as the reduction of drug absorption due to menopause, are less broadly known. Hormonal levels can have a distinct effect on drug reaction, and vice versa.
Drici and Clément (2001) suggest a couple of alternative explanations to some gender-differentiated reactions. They suggest that perhaps women's tendency to visit the doctor more frequently than men may have an effect, in that women may be on more medications (polypharmacy) than men, leading to more drug interactions. They also suggest that in cases of subjective assessment, women may be interpreting their symptoms differently than equivalent reactions in men.
Do drug testing protocols need a complete overhaul to examine the differences in male and female reactions? Is this comparable to the BiDil case, a drug that tested as only being effective in blacks? As Taylor and Ellis point out in their 2002 review, "racial categorization acts as only a surrogate marker ... any identified differences will not apply to all members of each stratified group." Another concern is the relaxed attitude in health industry toward female health. If different drugs are developed for men and women, will as much emphasis be put on the development of each?
I haven't noticed any difference in my response to drugs since transition, but since I'm in relatively good health, my experience with drugs is very limited. It seems like everyone I know has a "non-standard" reaction to one drug or another. I become giddy, rather than calm or sleepy, on most opiates (e.g. Percoset, Vicodin, codeine). I worry about the divisive effects of splitting people into medical categories, but that's largely a product of the society I function in. A society that didn't see differences as necessarily divisive (or ranked) might be more able to use our legitimate physical differences to aid in research and care, without costing anyone their humanity.