I was watching a movie on TV today when I saw a commercial for the drug Nexium. I've thought about this probably every time I've seen a commercial for some prescription drug on TV, I just never wrote down my feelings about it.

I don't think the companies should be aloud to advertise prescription drugs on TV. And I have a few reasons for this.

1. It's not something you can just go out and buy. You need to have a doctor sit down and write a prescription for it. So there really isn't much of a need to plug it to every single person watching TV.

2. It causes people to self diagnose. I can't even count the amount of times I watched TV with a friend when Paxil or something was advertised and they said, "I should get my doctor to give me that." And I will admit, I've been guilty of it once or twice myself.

3. Once people have made up their mind that their heartburn is horrible and their esophagus is going to erode the next time they eat a pizza, they go to the doctor and badger him or her to give them this prescription.

The deal here is this. With drugs you can get over the counter there isn't much you can do about stop those advertisements. It's things you can get right away and it's normally painkillers of some sort.

But with something like a prescription drug...if the companies want to go and advertise to the doctors themselves, that is fine. Those are the people who have control over figuring out who needs it and when it's time to prescribe it. So go and tell the doctors what it is for and why this is the perfect drug to prescribe. Don't tell the millions of people who get heartburn once a month and panic that it's too often, or the people who get a little nervous going into the grocery store or worry about their bills and start to believe they have anxiety.

There's a time and a place. And there are certain people. Sell it to the ones who know, not the ones who panic from lack of knowing.