Kevin Drum

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

Today, LA Times columnist David Lazarus answers a question I’ve been curious about for some time: where do the generic names for drugs come from? For example, the two chemo drugs I take are Pomalyst™ and Darzalex™, aka pomalidomide and daratumumab. But where do those generic names come from?

The answer, it turns out, is two women who work for USAN, the United States Adopted Names program. Stephanie Shubat explains how they come up with generic names for pharmaceuticals:

Shubat said this is done primarily by assigning uniform “stems” to drug names — that is, drugs with similar structures or purposes will have similar-sounding names, or parts of their names. The anti-anxiety drug lorazepam, for instance, would share “azepam” with similar medications; cortisone derivatives would have “cort” somewhere in their generic name.

The artistry comes in the assignation of a prefix, Shubat said. Unlike with celecoxib, the prefix shouldn’t hark back to the name-brand drug. Nor should it be potentially offensive in any language….She also said USAN will put the kibosh on generic names that include the letters W, K, H, J and Y, because they could create confusion abroad for non-English speakers with different pronunciations….“Sometimes I look at license plates for new prefix ideas,” Shubat confided. “Sometimes I borrow from the names of cats or dogs.”

I figured out the “stem” part of this long ago, since similar drugs usually have identical stems. But I could never make any sense out of the stuff before that. I always figured it must have something to do with the specific chemical compound, but boy was I wrong. It comes from license plates and cat names. Yeesh.

However, I’m curious about Shubat’s claim that they no longer allow generic names that are too similar to the trademarked name. Take a look at the two chemo drugs I use. Both of them borrow the first three letters of the trademark name as the first three letters of the generic name. Apparently the pharmaceutical folks are trickier about getting their way than Shubat thinks.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate