Ever heard of Viagra, Rogaine, or Ozempic? The process for turning a chemical compound into a household name is both a science and an art. In fact, naming a prescription drug can take a manufacturer up to four years, as a set of three monikers per medicine must run the gauntlet of several regulatory agencies.
It all starts with determining a drug’s chemical and generic names — both of which involve established rules. After those are settled, the rest is marketing.
So how do some drugs become memorable? What global trends dominate drug naming? And what happens when a company gets it wrong? Get all the answers in our season 8 opener.
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Featuring
Rocio Fabbro is a staff writer at Quartz and the host of Season 8 of the Quartz Obsession podcast. She’s obsessed with etymology, matcha, and late ’90s-early ’00s romcoms.
Bruce Gil is a staff writer at Quartz. He’s obsessed with Drag Race, telenovelas, and JustSalad.
Show notes
International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry IUPAC
U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)
The United States Adopted Names (USAN) Council
World Health Organization
Transcript
Rocio: Picture this. You’re at the pharmacy, picking up a prescription, and the pharmacist hands you a bottle with a name that sounds like it belongs in a sci-fi novel. Stelara, Comirnaty, Sronyx, Where do these names come from? Who comes up with them? And why do they sound so, well, weird?
I’m Rocio Fabbro, the host of Quartz Obsession Season 8. Today, I’m talking to Bruce Gil, staff writer for Quartz, who has been digging deep into the fascinating world of drug names. Bruce, on a scale of one to a four-year-long naming process, how obsessed are you with the art and science of naming drugs?
Bruce: Let’s say a five year level of interest. Very, very invested, even more than the typical.
Rocio: Wow, longer than the process it takes. And that’s exactly what we’re going to unravel today. The science and art behind the names that can make or break a drug’s success. It’s a journey that involves multiple regulatory agencies, years of research and development, and a delicate balance between science and marketing.
So, grab your prescription pad and get ready to explore the captivating world of drug names with Bruce Gil.
Bruce, let’s start at the beginning. What’s the first step in naming a new drug?
Bruce: It all starts when like a medication is first discovered, and it’s a chemical name. And that rules for setting a chemical’s name is already decided by there’s a group called the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry.
But these names can be very long and convoluted and aren’t useful. So we need another shorter name and that’s why we get generic name. These are public domain names that kind of have to be standardized around the world. So there’s no confusion. So really the system was put in place in like the 1950s because once people started like traveling abroad more often, you know, they forgot their medication.
They had to be able to go to, you know, another country and able to get the same medication without any confusion. So that’s why we have this system in place right now.
Rocio: So, travel is one of the main reasons why this exists. And yeah, it makes sense that these drugs are life or death things that can have impacts on people when they’re in different countries and there’s a need for this universal sort of standard.
What are some of the established rules and guidelines for creating these names? And talk a little bit more about why they’re so important and what kinds of problems can arise if they don’t exist.
Bruce: The second step, again, is the generic name process, and this all starts when drugs are going to the clinical trial stage.
And so, usually, the drug companies can suggest names. They all have to be passed by this group called the United States Adopted Name Council. And they have, you know, kind of rules on how those names get suggested. Usually, a class of drugs, or drugs that kind of work in the same way, or treat in the same illness, kind of have a stem, a unique stem, that groups them together.
For example, the Ozempic, Wegovy, weight loss drugs that we’re all like seeing kind of skyrocket right now. All of their generic names end with Tide, Semaglutide, Tirzepatide. And the unique thing that kind of differentiates their names of these drugs is the prefixes. And so there’s rules on what the prefixes can be.
So there’s no confusion around the world. They don’t allow the letters W, K, H, J, and Y.
Rocio: Why is that?
Bruce: In other languages, they might not use those letters, or they might sound different, and it could cause confusion.
Rocio: Interesting. So once the chemical and generic names are settled, the focus shifts to marketing for these pharmaceutical companies.
And so how do they approach the branding and naming of their drugs in a way that will appeal not to doctors and scientists, but to a mass audience?
Bruce: Yeah, this is where like kind of like the artistry and like the marketing and comes into all the names We know now, you know, a lot of people aren’t familiar with the chemical or generic names But they are familiar with the brand names You know, that’s how we get names like Tylenol and again Ozempic, Zepbound, Wegovy. And so companies spend a lot of time and a lot of years coming up with these names They work with naming agencies and it they really start with thousands of names, you know, create a list of thousands of names and they think about like what does this drug do?
Say what kind of emotions do we want these drug names to have so people, you know, feel safe. They’re taking medication. They’re taking these products for their health. So it all starts with a huge list of names and then they start whittling it down by like what they know The FDA all these agencies that have to approve the name.
They they know what they don’t like They don’t like names that promise too much. They don’t like names that are too fanciful to like promotional. Like you’re not allowed to use like parts of the generic name. Cause then that, you know, might create either confusion or an unfair advantage for like the companies that have the generic name in their brand name.
But they look everywhere for inspiration. I know there’s some companies that look like a cowboy dictionary, surfer dictionaries.
Rocio: They want to be the coolest one on the market, right?
Bruce: Yeah. And then that’s why we get like really like interesting names, like Lyrica or like Stelara, stuff that evokes an emotion, but at the same time, it has to be kind of neutral and not be misleading in any way or cause confusion and it has to be unique, there’s a huge balance in all these different needs that these drug names have to meet.
Rocio: I read somewhere that this entire process to give a drug a name can take up to four years, which sounds like a really long time. What are the main challenges that companies face along the way in this process until they come to the name, and why does it take so long?
Bruce: It all comes down to making sure you meet regulatory requirements.
So, you know, once they have this big list of names, they have to, you know, keep cutting it down. They do surveys of what works, what doesn’t work. They ask, you know, doctors, they try it in different languages. Like this doesn’t mean something else in a different language that we don’t want it to look bad on us.
It’s a huge process.
Rocio: Yeah. And it’s not just pharmaceutical companies and manufacturers that are involved in it, right? There are regulators who have their own concerns and their own guidelines and their own standards that need to be met. So how do these regulators, like the FDA, for example, influence the process?
Bruce: The FDA has to, like, balance a whole bunch of things to prove a drug name. Again, it can’t over promise. It can create an unfair advantage and also can’t create confusion. When things are getting prescribed, they go as far as writing down the name and you know, seeing how it is written. Does it look similar to other names?
So when you know, doctors are actually prescribing it, does it sound different in different accents? Those are all like things that can kill a name if it’s too. If it’s promotional, if it creates an unfair advantage for one company, if it creates confusion, these are all things that, you know, the FDA thinks about.
Rocio: So companies put all of this time and effort and probably a lot of money into finding the perfect name, one that resonates with people, one that will attract people, will make them stand out above their competitors. But can you share an example of a time when a drug company got it wrong? Has there been a time, and what were the consequences, and how did the company address that after the fact?
Bruce: In the ‘90s, there was a drug that we now call it Prilosec, but we used to go by the name Losec. And there was a new drug that came around in the 90s called Lasex, which created some confusion, and you know, it even led to reports of like, you know, people dying due to the confusion. And so, they had to change the name to Prilosec.
That’s why it’s so important that these names are vetted and even to this day, like, there’s research by the Institute of Medicine that, you know, every year 1.5 million Americans either get sick or injured because, you know, prescribing errors.
Rocio: Wow. And I mean, doctors have notoriously bad handwriting. So that’s just something that probably is very dangerous.
Having names that are even a little bit similar can cause a lot of confusion and even death, like you mentioned. And I think that’s really important.
Words evolve, meanings evolve, the way we speak has changed so much since the 1950s when these naming conventions started. What are some of those global trends that we are currently seeing dominate drug naming and how have these trends evolved over time with the things that are trendy and popular, especially today with social media?
Bruce: I think right now we’re seeing a huge trend in like the influence of silicon valley We’re seeing a lot more drug names with like the letters X, J, Z, Q in them. According to you know, like experts these letters evoke cutting edge high tech I already gave these examples before but you see it in like weight loss drugs like Ozempic, Zepbound. And there’s also research that, you know, some consumers do like drugs with the letter z and x it makes them feel like either it’s unique or like maybe the X makes the drug work better.
There’s a lot of interesting, like marketing behind all of these names.
Rocio: And we see with social media, some of these drugs become household names and they become memes sometimes. They spin off into other things like Ozempic face to describe the sallow kind of look of people who use Ozempic. Or, back in the day, the Prozac moment when people were just having a really happy rush of joy.
Kind of associated with that antidepressant medication. Can you talk a little bit about how some of these drug names have also become household names and have also become part of our daily lexicon? And what makes those drugs so memorable and effective?
Bruce: All the products that you named are such good examples of this. When a drug company gets the name right, it has such a huge impact on not only the drug, but also like the illnesses it’s treating. Prozac doesn’t really mean anything to anyone, but now it does. It rolls off the tongue, but it also like, in it becoming a household name, it also, you know, brought to the surface conversations about, mental health and depression that we probably didn’t have in the past.
The same thing with Ozempic. There’s a lot more conversations on weight loss and health and how people are dealing with all these issues. It really shows what a good name can like do for not only a drug company, but also like healthcare and the way we talk about our health and our bodies. There’s another example that are like a lot of people that talk about drug names bring up.
It’s a little embarrassing for some people, but Viagra has also such a strong name that everybody knows what it does. And it treats, you know, a condition people would never want to talk about, but it does affect people’s lives. This is a very interesting thing I heard about Viagra and how it got its name. It’s actually a combination of vigor and Niagara. Yeah, it’s supposed to like evoke streams and flows and stuff like that.
Rocio: Interesting, and that really is memorable and effective. It’s interesting that you mention how these drugs and the way that they come into the mainstream can also help do away with some taboos around conversations that are hard to have.
Bruce: It helps with stigmas, I guess, yeah.
Rocio: Bruce, have you come across any examples of drug names that they’re trying to be attractive, they’re trying to be memorable and get customers, but that they overpromise or mislead patients about a medication’s effects or safety and what have been some of the consequences of that?
Bruce: For sure. I think the FDA tries to like stop these when they can. And so there is certain like stuff that people just can’t use in their names anymore. They can’t allude to how fast something will work or that it’s a cure all. Like you can’t have a name that sounds like cure all or something that, you know, evokes, you know, a rapid response or something like that.
The hair product Rogaine, at one point they wanted to call it Regaine, but you know, it kind of promised too much. So they had to kind of tweak the name around to still evoke what they’re trying to do, but not make misleading promises.
Rocio: Now, Bruce, everything you’ve told us so far is so interesting. But to you, what is the most interesting fun fact about drug names that most people might not know?
Bruce: I think it’s super fascinating that in the U. S. the people that give like the final say off to some of these names is actually quite small.
The group that’s in charge of approving the generic names, the United States Adopted Name Council, is really only like two people and they have to approve about like 200 new generic drug names every year. That’s a lot of work for two people. That’s a lot of work. They’ve done interviews in like how they look for inspiration and coming up with different names.
They look at license plates. They look at ways to organize letters. So these names are all different from each other. And then there’s um, one naming agency that a lot of pharma companies go to, to come up with their brand names. It’s called the Brand Institute and they work on about like 75 percent of FDA approved names every year.
It’s like a very small world of people that actually come up and think about these names.
Rocio: Yeah, a very small, very influential group of people. And now looking ahead to the future of drug naming, do you anticipate that there will be any changes, innovations, in the way that these drugs are named? And what factors could potentially drive these changes?
Bruce: Yeah, I definitely feel like at some point there’s just kind of either going to be a shortage of names. You know, there’s already like 20,000 prescription drug products on the market. And that’s a lot of names, you know, it can lead to confusion. I’m not sure what the solution is there, but I can imagine people already thinking about using AI or something to like automate the system and, you know, eliminate any similarities or confusion.
Rocio: That’s really interesting. I think AI is a solution that these people might turn to to come up with some hybrid crazy names that we’ve never heard before. And then that would really be out of a sci-fi novel. What would you say are some of the key takeaways for our listeners about the art and science of naming pharmaceutical drugs?
Bruce: It’s important. Our system we have is definitely here to, you know, protect consumers and make sure people are getting the medicine they need and there isn’t any errors, trying to eliminate errors. I would just encourage people to like really pay attention to these names and think about all the process and work that goes into them.
And, you know, once you start thinking about it, you can be like a little game. Like how did they arrive at that? Now that you know a little bit about the background on like what they can’t use, what they can do and what they’re trying to go for, it’s fun to think about.
Rocio: I don’t think I’m ever going to hear one of those pharmaceutical drug commercials the same ever again. I think I’m always going to think about how they got there and whether it sounds like anything else, because you’re right. You don’t really see names that ever sound like anything else you’ve ever heard before. This has been great, Bruce. Thank you so much for joining us on today’s episode.
Bruce Gil is a staff writer at Quartz. This episode was produced by Podcast Fast Track with additional support from Jason Russum, Amy Perry, Liliana Zapata, Juan Palacios, and Lorena Caro. Our theme music is by Taka Yasuzawa and Alex Suguira. If you like what you heard, please subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you’re listening.
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I’m Rocio Fabbro. Thanks for listening.
Credits
The Quartz Obsession is produced by Podcast Fast Track, with additional support from Jason Russum, Amy Perry, Liliana Zapata, Juan Palacios, and Lorena Caro. Our theme music is by Taka Yasuzawa and Alex Suguira. This episode was recorded at G/O Media headquarters in New York.