New research shows that three quarters of mental health disorders are evident in patients by age 24.
If mental health disorders are most commonly first diagnosed in adolescent and young adult patients, it must be asked why so few patient-facing pharmaceutical websites aim to specifically provide treatment and disease information to this population.
One possible explanation is that pharmaceutical companies do not take the potential impact of the Internet to their bottom lines into serious consideration. However, current investments in online properties by the pharmaceutical industry suggest this is no longer true. Furthermore, many psychotherapeutic drugs also have their own websites. The question remains, however, whether these sites are relevant to younger users.
The majority of these sites are not designed with the diversity of their target audience in mind. Consider the current market for neuroleptics – the principal drugs used to treat schizophrenia. The median age of onset for schizophrenia in a male patient is between 15 and 25 years old. If one were to take a look at the websites for the top selling neuroleptic drugs in the US, it would become immediately clear that none of them were designed with the 15 to 25 year old male population in mind.
Instead of a pharmaceutical company website, these patients are increasingly seeking information about specific drug treatments in the large number of online community boards and chat rooms on mental health issues or via self-created blogs about their personal experiences. These individuals are going to each other, not the drug manufacturers, with questions, advice, personal stories and support.
The study published in the Archives of General Psychiatry concluded with the suggestion that interventions aimed at prevention or early treatment of mental health disorders need to focus on youth. This is one message that pharmaceutical companies need to take to heart. In order to reach the adolescent and young adult population it is not sufficient to be online, rather pharmaceutical companies have to be in line with what adolescents and young adults are currently seeking from online healthcare services.
