Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Uninspired Pharmaceutical Drug Names


Am I the only person who feels like the majority of pharmaceutical drugs available on the market now have really uninspiring commercial names? Names like Cialis, Cymbalta, Levitra, Celebrex, Chantix, Wellbutrin, Strattera, and on and on.


You can just imagine some meeting room full of high-paid business consultants tasked with the job of coming up with a littany of these names. Pinhead groupthink sets in until one of the younger plebes saves them all by devising an efficient formula like this:


Noun (fun object) - Last letter + Typical drug suffix (ra, ta, ex, ix)


For instance, the drug Cymbalta = fun object ("cymbals") - last letter ("s") + typical drug ending ("ta"). The drug companies are so happy with the generic results that they keep hiring the same firm who keeps using the same formula that keeps getting unleashed on us consumers. All these drug names end up sounding bad emo bands from Holland.


As opposed to the cheesy names that are in use now, the drug companies should go with a different naming scheme that really motivates people to buy these drugs more. For added effectiveness, the names should connote virility and power and preferably sound like antagonists from old Nintendo games. My naming scheme, which subtly tweaks the typical drug one, would go like this:


Name of Norse deity - Last letter + My drug suffix (atrix, itrix, aton, ator, opolis)


For example, you take Loki (Norse god, shape shifter, trickster) - last letter ("i") + drug suffix ("aton") and get Lokaton. If your doctor told you that your toenail fungus could be cured by taking Lokaton, wouldn't you feel so powerful that your immune system would crush the fungus? How about if you suffered from depression; wouldn't a prescription of Baduhennitrix (Baduhenna - a + itrix) make you feel like you could take on the world?

I couldn't wait to see the commercials for these new drugs...

4 comments:

  1. Thats awesome, I like your logic!

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  2. hilarious....
    Have you read Survivor by Palahniuk? There is an entire section devoted to naming pharmaceuticals.

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  3. I never did read "Survivor", but I wanted to. I will add it to my list of things to read...

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  4. Haha... Emo and Holland should never mix! But the thought sure does make me smile.

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