12/16/2005 9:01:00 AM EST

Direct-to-consumer advertising promoting the use of erythropoietin to alleviate cancer-related fatigue fails to point out that the drug is only effective against fatigue caused by anemia. However, anemia is not a significant cause of fatigue in most cancer patients, according to a study in the December issue (Volume 8, Number 6) of Journal of Palliative Medicine, a peer-reviewed publication of Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., and the official journal of the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine. The paper is available free online at http://www.liebertonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1089/jpm.2005.8.1144

Fatigue is one of the most common and debilitating symptoms for patients with cancer, affecting as many as 80% of patients. It can be devastating–making even routine tasks like going to work, shopping, or doing daily chores exhausting. Fatigue can, in turn, lead to hopelessness and despair. Current direct-to-consumer advertising in the U.S. gives the mistaken impression that anemia is the only cause of fatigue from cancer and chemotherapy. Further, the ads give false hope, implying that a drug to treat anemia will make everything better.

Although authors Tina Noergaard Munch, M.D., and colleagues from the Department of Palliative Care and Rehabilitation Medicine at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, in Houston, Texas, reported that fatigue was the most severe symptom among patients with advanced cancer receiving palliative care in this retrospective study, they found no significant correlation between fatigue and anemia.

Treatment to relieve the symptoms associated with cancer has not received much attention in the past. Recently, however, drug companies have begun marketing drugs directly to consumers on television and in newspaper advertisements, touting the drugs’ ability to improve quality of life for cancer patients. Unfortunately, these ads invariably imply that a drug can help anyone.

“This data will help physicians resist the patient and family pressure to use erythropoietin because they saw it on television,” says Charles F. von Gunten, M.D., Ph.D., Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Palliative Medicine. “There are different things that can be done to relieve fatigue. Erythropoietin is ineffective in relieving fatigue if anemia is not the cause. It is an expensive placebo.”

Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., is a privately held media company known for establishing authoritative peer-reviewed journals in many promising areas of science and biomedical research, including AIDS Patient Care and STDs, Disease Management, and The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine. Its biotechnology trade magazine, Genetic Engineering News (GEN), was the first in its field and is today the industry’s most widely read publication worldwide. A complete list of the firm’s 60 journals, newsmagazines, and books is available at www.liebertpub.com.