AP ads target women?

I've been watching a lot of tv lately and noticed that every bipoar med advert was about a woman! They have one with a roller coaster, one with an elevator and several other on bipolar depression that target women, yet men get bipolar too. Why target women? Is this a case of medicate the women but lock up the men? Or do manly men not need meds according to big pharma? What do you think?

I think I read somewhere (a while ago) that women are more likely to seek treatment for any kind of mental health issue than men are -- so perhaps these pharmaceutical companies are playing off that? (Target marketing.) Also -- and this is just a guess -- maybe women are more likely to develop bipolar disorder than men are. Or, these companies may be playing off women's emotions, or some combination of all three.

Nevertheless, I agree that they should target men too. Seems rather one sided to only target women, IMO. But most pharmaceutical companies are corrupt and will try their best to make as much money as possible, so maybe they don't care about men (as mean as that sounds).

Yes I think women are more apt to seek treatment before a crisis but I think I read somewhere ( a long time ago so it could be wrong now) that men are more apt to get diganoised with bipolar and szizophena than women. I don't know. The sheer number of ads for APs was absurd

Come to think of it, you are correct! I cannot recall a single TV ad that shows a man with BP. Sure seems odd.

I agree part of it is ... women do seek help statistically sooner than males.

If you think of when the commercials are playing is another factor. I have never seen a commercial about any kind of psych Med during a football game on tv. But it’s plaster all over between shows that have an a strong female audience.

But women will see the commercials and will mention it to there husbands, male friends and family.

It’s all about marketing.

In the United States, women are the primary healthcare decision makers in most homes. Perhaps that is also why they are being targeted.

Just thought about it, and you're right. Same thing with antidepressants.

Thanks, Nammu, for sharing your observation with us. I have seen this, yet never really thought about it.

For many years, I have read that not only are women more likely to seek medical help, women are more likely to experience more illness. The theory was that the hormonal changes in woman set off more "disease states.' However, this data may not necessarily be correct ; since women were the majority seeking help, it is assumed women have a higher rate of illness. We cannot know this if the men are not seeking medical help for their symptoms. I, personally, do intuitively feel women do suffer more illnesses of most types due to the frequent shifts in hormones.

In addition to the possibility of hormonal shifts causing more illnesses, there are other factors which may contribute to this. One factor might be that women more often play the role of caretaker in many types of situations, often not having a highly balanced life. Due to social expectations, many women suppress their own desires, goals, feelings in order to meet the expectations of those around the women. I feel this is also shifting to some degree.

Then again, I may be mistaken.
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I think the marketing trend might be changing. Commercials for Psoriatic Arthritis, for example, feature both men and women.

Interesting topic, Nammu! Thanks!

Ah yes, the wonderful Vraylar commercials. They always have the woman buying too many cameras too.

This is a really interesting topic, and I agree with you Nammu that it is truly mystifying that these pharma companies are targeting women. I wonder if women are being diagnosed more with BP than men these days. Certainly, big pharma has the wherewithal to study these things in great detail, so maybe, for some reason, it is the case.

This is a little off-topic, but I also wanted to point out how stereotypical the Vraylar rollercoaster ride commercial is: it seems to indicate that people with BP are constantly up/down/up/down, uber-rapidly, with nothing in between. I feel like this is the stereotype many people hold of people with BP, but it's just not the case.

I also don't like that, so far anyway, they have shown mania as only angry-mania (at the top of the rollercoaster) -and over-spending- and not the euphoria with other symptoms, that many of us experience.

But anyway, it is, as I say, the rollercoaster ride that really gets to me!

Yeah what the ad shows on the roller coaster is more typical of borderline than bipolar but also women get hit with that stereotype of being overly emotional anyway.