In 2011 a new cancer drug was approved, Provenge, from Dendreon Corp.  And I blogged about it then.  First of its kind, blah, blah, blah.  Short answer, about 4 months longer survival, which I do not oppose.  And it is $93,000.  But I already covered that.  This is about the business side of that equation.  The company just tok a header on an announcement of slower that anticipated growth:

"Chris Raymond, an analyst with Robert W. Baird & Co, who rates the company “Neutral” with a price target of $14, said he was unimpressed with the latest disclosure, and that it’s a sign Dendreon needs to do a better job of persuading its current base of physician customers to start prescribing the drug more avidly. “For us to get more constructive on the stock, we would need to see tangible evidence of an inflection point in Provenge account penetration,” he wrote"(Xconomy)

My interest is in the way in which the analyst identifies the 'problem' and the solution.  Dendreon has to do a better job of talking MDs into prescribing their drug.  Hmmmm.  Why would that be?  If the drug is so effective at improving outcomes, then what is the hesitation?  Could it be the model, where oncologist think about drug sales to patients as a principle profit center?  Or that the side-effects + benefits/costs is not as attractive to anyone as purported?  The state of oncology today is the incremental extension of a life at the very terminal end.  Pharmaceutical involution continues.