Panadol

Relief in a jiffy!

By Earl D.C. Bracamonte

Panadol, the world’s trusted pain reliever is now in the Philippines. The new formulation contains Optizorb; making it the paracetamol brand which starts releasing the pain relieving power of paracetamol in five minutes! GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), makers of Panadol, announced the brand’s entry through a media launch at the Peninsula Manila recently.

After ingestion, the tablet attracts water to produce carbon dioxide. As water integrates with the gas, it now disintegrates with the formulation to arrest pain. That’s why relief is fast; it’s the chemical reaction that makes it so.

“Panadol gives fast relief like opiates. Opiates are similar meds but have more side effects, are more expensive, and needs a yellow prescription. Doctors need a special number to issue these. Not all doctors carry an S2 license ‘coz it’s something they need to acquire after the lapse of a three-year period.

“A lot of my patients need physical therapy. So I give prescriptive analgesia before I induce pain. Patients need to arrest pain as they perceive it. You can take 4 grams of paracetamol in a day; or up to 8 tablets in 24 hours, 1-2 tablets once every 4-6 hours,” shared Dr. Lyde Alday-Magpantay, noted Pain & Rehabilitation Med specialist holding clinics at the St’ Luke’s Hospital and Ospital ng Makati, during an intimate media roundtable colloquy.

Panadol is a paracetamol-based analgesic and provides fast, effective temporary relief to pain and discomfort associated with headache, period pain, tension headache, cold & flu symptoms, migraine, muscular aches, arthritis/osteoarthritis, backache, and toothache. It also helps to reduce fever and a good choice of pain reliever for people with sensitive stomachs, stomach ulcers, and other stomach disorders. Panadol can also be used by breast-feeding women.

“Pain is one of the greatest personal, social, and economic burdens faced by people around the world. Panadol has helped consumers find relief across 85 countries for over 50 years and today we are pleased to bring the leading paracetamol brand to the Philippine market. This is a significant milestone for GSK in line with our global commitment to help people do more, feel better, and live longer,” enthused John Sayers, consumer healthcare president for Asia-Pacific and Latin America.

Panadol with Optizorb is the only paracetamol brand with the unique disintegration system that allows the release of its efficacy in as little as five minutes as against regular tablets. Studies conducted by GSK have proven that 75 per cent of people who have taken Panadol reach pain-relieving levels of paracetamol in the bloodstream significantly faster than those taking other generic pain-relieving brands.

“The brand is testament to our customers’ trust and faith in the product which boasts an extensive scientific research breakthrough such as the Optizorb technology in our new Panadol because it is the first and only paracetamol product that contains it,” Sayers added.

With a greater rate of absorption, Panadol delivers therapeutic concentrations to most people suffering from a variety of pain; even those with common medical conditions such as stomach problems and heart disease.

“Following a study conducted in the Philippines, we found that seven out of ten Filipinos suffer from regular headaches, and over half from muscle aches and pains in the past three months alone. These pain sufferers have indicated fast relief of pain is of core importance and this has encouraged us to provide a fast and effective solution like Panadol to alleviate this health condition,” remarked Jeoffrey Yulo, general manager of GSK Philippines’ consumer healthcare division.

The world’s trusted pain reliever will be made readily accessible to consumers and pharmacies all over the archipelago starting February 2014.

GSK, one of the world’s leading research-based pharmaceutical and healthcare companies and distributor of Panadol, is committed to improving the quality of human life by enabling people to do more, feel better and live longer. For more information, simply visit the company’s Web site, www.gsk.com. As for further details on pain management, just log-on to www.Panadol.com.