Premarin / Provera / Prempro: What are they?

• Premarin: Premarin, manufactured by Wyeth, is the commercial name for the compound drug consisting primarily of conjugated estrogens.
  
• Provera: Provera, manufactured by Upjohn (now Pfizer), is the commercial name for the drug that is derived from progesterone.
  
• Prempro: Prempro, also manufactured by Wyeth, is a hormone replacement therapy drug that is primarily used by post-menopausal women to replace hormones and to help prevent osteoporosis and bone density loss. It is a combination of premarin (which is estrogen) and progesterone and is the drug primarily involved in hormone replacement therapy lawsuits.
  

Suffered harm from Prempro? You may have a lawsuit. Click here, for a top rated law firm to evaluate your legal rights.

Prempro's serious side effects

Prempro, which was approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 1994, has been linked to various side effects including heart attacks, strokes and breast cancer. In 2003, following a study conducted by the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) showing these links, the FDA required Wyeth to change Prempro's labeling to include information from the WHI study – specifically that the drug may increase the risk of myocardial infarctions (heart attacks), strokes, invasive breast cancer, pulmonary embolisms (blood clots), and deep vein thrombosis (deep vein blood clots) in postmenopausal women who take the drug for more than 5 years.

The FDA also required Wyeth to include labeling information that warned consumers that Prempro should only be prescribed at the lowest effective dose for the shortest duration that is consistent with the patient's treatment goals.

Profits over patients

It is estimated that over 6,000,000 women take Prempro. Yet, despite the additional warnings and thousands of lawsuits linking the drug to breast cancer and other illnesses, Wyeth has not taken the product off the market. Industry experts allege that Wyeth has been aware of the dangers of Prempro for many years, but because sales of the product are so high (over $1 billion dollars in 2006 and 2007); no further action has been taken – leaving millions of women at risk of serious injury.

Suffered harm from Prempro? You may have a lawsuit. Click here, for a top rated law firm to evaluate your legal rights.