Commercials that bug you?

[kork13]

Can I just say "ALL OF THEM"? I find commercials frustrating and demeaning, for many of the reasons already stated. Anytime I watch TV (not frequently), I seriously NEED to find at least 3 shows to flip between so I can avoid the commercials. If I can't, I'll get up and walk away during commercials (TV is muted as well). They seriously are infuriating to me. It kills me that people actually are roped into products by TV commercials.

[NeedaDollar]

I hate commercials that last longer that 30 seconds....so that's all of them . I really hate those commercials that last for about 5 mins. The really irritate me.

[asmom]

There's one in particular I hate these days: a lady is eating Total cereal and her husband walks in and asks her if she's trying to lose weight and she's such a witch about it when the poor guy was just asking because of something he read on the box.

[jIM_Ohio]

Most commercials bug me since they are almost all for products that you don't need and they encourage people to spend more than they should.

More specifically, I hate a lot of the fast food commercials, particularly the ones that push the 2-for sales, like McDonald's advertising 2 breakfast sandwiches for $3. It's bad enough that people eat that garbage at all. Nobody should be eating 2 of them in one sitting.

Tops on my list of annoying commercials, which I strongly feel should be banned, are ads for prescription medications. I think this was one of the government's huge failures when they voted to allow this to happen. Advertising to the public does nothing but encourage overuse of costly products that, in many cases, aren't needed. And advertising controlled, highly addictive medications like sleeping pills is totally insane. Why not just start running ads for cocaine?

Along these lines is the drug commercials which describe the symptoms.

In some cases the symptoms of the medication sound worse than the disease. No cure thank you.

The other one is when the drug says not for women who are pregnant, might become pregnant or who are nursing. Based my probability charts that covers 100% of all women not past menopause.

[geojen]

The thing I hate about all commercials is that the volume on them is waayy to loud. I have the show I am watching set to a good level, and then the commercials come on and practically blow me out of my chair. Irritating.

I HATE the cadilac comercial with the guy driving the car in the tunnel, and he's like so I have a comfortable life in the suburbs and a comfortable office and a comfortable life and I'm supposed to drive a little efficient car to and from my comfortable life? OBNOXIOUS!

I also hate these corn syrup commercials they have been airing these days. WTF is up with those? Since the product is in pretty much everything you buy at the grocery store, is it really necessary to market to people how corn syrup is "made from corn (oohh, really, corn syrup is made from corn? Who knew) and that it is fine in moderation."

[disneysteve]

The other one is when the drug says not for women who are pregnant, might become pregnant or who are nursing.

My favorite is the one where a man is asking his doctor what the side effects are (I think it's a Crestor ad) and the doctor rattles off that statement about it not being for woman who are pregnant, nursing or might become pregnant. Why exactly is he giving that warning to his MALE patient?

[kork13]

Along these lines is the drug commercials which describe the symptoms.

In some cases the symptoms of the medication sound worse than the disease. No cure thank you.

Oh, I love those.... I forget which one, but there's a commercial in which at least half of the 2-minute spot is listing all of the potential side-effects and cautions and such.... kills me. (and the patients who use it, apparentely )

[disneysteve]

As much as I hate drug ads, what I hate even more is medical device ads - like the patient really has any part in the decision-making process here. If I need a joint replacement, am I going to go in and tell the board-certified orthopedic surgeon with decades of experience that I don't want the prosthesis that he recommends but to give me the one I saw on TV instead?

[kork13]

Wait, I've got it.... The most annoying commercial man on TV... Billy Mays, the guy with that aggravatingly high, excited, nasal voice, who first started advertising Oxi-Clean, then other cleaning agents, then gardening, life insurance, and currently the "Mighty Mend-it" (just saw a bit of that one... ::shudder:: ) i can't stand that guy.

[Cassandra]

I can't stand it when I am watching TV on a certain volume level and the commercial is about five times louder than the show. And this usually happens at a time when I need the volume to remain low. Arrgh!

I hate pretty much every Geico commercial. The cavemen and especially the newer ones where the stack of bills has eye balls and is following people.

[pearlieq]

As much as I hate drug ads, what I hate even more is medical device ads - like the patient really has any part in the decision-making process here. If I need a joint replacement, am I going to go in and tell the board-certified orthopedic surgeon with decades of experience that I don't want the prosthesis that he recommends but to give me the one I saw on TV instead?

Of course I'm going to have a big part in the decision process for a device surgically inserted inside of me and I'm horrified to hear someone suggest otherwise!

If my board-certified orthopedic surgeon gets his little ego bruised when I want to discuss the pros and cons of the prosthesis he recommends, I'll be finding another surgeon, thank you very much.

We are never going to achieve effective health care reform in this country if we can't let go of this "doctor as God" myth. Patients need to be active participants in their health care decisions and they need to question their doctors about the decisions they make like they would for every other purchase.

I spent 3 months paying $40/month for an eye drop my doctor gave me for eye irritation. I finally got frustrated and asked if there were any lower cost alternatives. It turns out there was a cheaper version of the drops that needed to be used twice a day instead of once. The doctor said there was no reason for me to use the more expensive drug except for convenience.

Did he ask me what I preferred? Did he even mention the cheaper alternative? No--he just pulled out his drug company pen and wrote me out a script for the pricey one. That was the last time I ever just took a prescription from a doctor without asking questions and doing research.

It irks me when people imply that direct to consumer drug advertising is a bad idea because consumers are too stupid to understand that not all drugs advertised may be appropriate for them. I don't think that's the case, I think it really underestimates people, and I think it pushes people even farther away from responsibility for their own health care.

[project15]

No one has mentioned the radio commercials (primarily) where the people say "I owed over $3 million to the IRS and I only had to pay $500k!" If that's true, then I'M the one paying for what they didn't pay!

[skylovessea]

Has anyone seen the commercials about saving your money with the man-pig?!

It's like Feed the Pig or something.

I don't know why but they get under my skin and kind of creep me out!

[disneysteve]

Of course I'm going to have a big part in the decision process for a device surgically inserted inside of me and I'm horrified to hear someone suggest otherwise!

It irks me when people imply that direct to consumer drug advertising is a bad idea because consumers are too stupid to understand that not all drugs advertised may be appropriate for them.

I don't want to hijack the thread and turn in into a debate about DTC advertising. Let me just say that I think it is impossible for any patient to make an informed decision about a medication, treatment or medical device based on a 30-second TV commercial.

Sure you should be involved in treatment decisions. You should absolutely ask questions and find out what your options are. A multi-million dollar ad campaign does not help you do that. In 2007 alone, $5.375 BILLION dollars was spent on DTC advertising. I can think of a whole lot of better things that could have been done to improve healthcare in this country with well over $5 billion dollars in just one year.

And that isn't even taking into account all the wasteful prescribing that takes place as a result of DTC advertising. That raises the tab for DTC advertising far higher, into the tens of billions of dollars.

You imply that a doctor may be influenced by a 5-cent plastic pen but apparently think it is just fine for companies to spend billions and billions to directly influence patients. I have to strongly disagree with you on that.

Sorry for the off-topic rant.

[poundwise]

There was one drug that, no lie, no exaggeration, said that one of its side effects was, "Increased chance of death."

That's not only unsettling, in general, but a little vague. Its like they are saying, "We don't know why, but people using this drug seem to die more often."