{"id":234718,"date":"2026-01-08T19:14:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-08T19:14:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/234718\/"},"modified":"2026-01-08T19:14:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-08T19:14:08","slug":"what-doctors-want-you-to-know-before-you-take-a-prescription-drug-off-label","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/234718\/","title":{"rendered":"What doctors want you to know before you take a prescription drug off-label"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Fanning the flames is the fact that trust in science and the healthcare system is at \u201can all time low,\u201d Kado says, and Schrack agrees. \u201cThe traditional healthcare system works better for some than for others, but there\u2019s no doubt that we need to try to do better so that there\u2019s more equitable access to care and the things that people need.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Direct-to-consumer start-ups are emerging alongside this trend, offering more convenient access to these drugs, often marketing them in a lifestyle or self-improvement context\u2014a model that appears to resonate with many consumers. Seventy percent of consumers (and 79 percent of Gen Z) use health tech, a category that includes online prescription services, monthly, per the <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\" https:\/\/www.pwc.com\/us\/en\/industries\/health-industries\/library\/healthcare-consumer-insights-survey.html\" target=\"_blank\" dir=\"ltr\">PwC\u2019s 2025 US Healthcare Consumer Insights Survey<\/a>. \u00a0\u201c[DTCs] are proliferating because they are easier in some ways than navigating the traditional healthcare system,\u201d Schrack says. \u201cBut these are for-profit companies,\u201d she says, and regulations around them are murky.<\/p>\n<p>Real meds, real risks<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Prescription drugs can offer real benefits\u2014but they can also come with real, and sometimes severe, risks. \u201cWhatever you put in your mouth, from a supplement all the way to prescription drugs, you can suffer unintended adverse consequences,\u201d Kado says, adding that even aspirin has the potential to cause bleeding ulcers. Some drugs being explored for preventive use illustrate that tradeoff. Rapamycin, for example, has shown promise, Schrack says, but it can also suppress the immune system, potentially increasing vulnerability to infections.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">But Caplan adds that the people most inclined to experiment with these drugs may also be more comfortable with risk in general. \u201cThe people who tend to be chasing longevity by repurposing drugs, they tend to be people who are wealthy and often who have careers where taking risks has produced great wealth,\u201d Caplan says. \u201cI think they\u2019re talking to doctors half the time only to say, \u2018I want you to write me this prescription, or I\u2019m going to leave and find somebody who will,\u2019\u201d he says.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Risks aside, there\u2019s no guarantee the drugs will deliver the intended benefits\u2014especially when they\u2019re used outside their approved purpose. \u201cThe thing about some of these exploratory agents like rapamycin and others, is that a lot of the benefits we see are in animals and they don\u2019t always translate to humans,\u201d Schrack says.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fanning the flames is the fact that trust in science and the healthcare system is at \u201can all&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":234719,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[119575,119577,103,397,396,61,60,119571,119573,119576,119570,119574,119572,119578],"class_list":{"0":"post-234718","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-are-prescription-drugs-the-new-supplements","9":"tag-glp-1-drugs-preventive-use","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-health-care","12":"tag-healthcare","13":"tag-ie","14":"tag-ireland","15":"tag-off-label-drug-use","16":"tag-prescription-drugs-and-healthspan","17":"tag-prescription-drugs-for-longevity","18":"tag-prescription-drugs-for-prevention","19":"tag-preventive-health-medications","20":"tag-preventive-medicine-prescription-drugs","21":"tag-rapamycin-anti-aging-research"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234718","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=234718"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234718\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/234719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=234718"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=234718"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=234718"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}