Trade names of medicinal products

Creation principles and linguistic characteristics

Commercial drug brands are created empirically by pharmaceutical manufacturers, i.e., arbitrarily. The main goal of such a name is successful sales and brand recognition. For a drug to be registered, its name must meet several strict requirements.

First, it must not coincide with names already in circulation. Second, the new word must differ fundamentally in its external phonetic and graphic appearance from analogues. Third, short forms are preferred. Linguistically, such terms represent neologism words. When creating them, authors usually do not embed explicit signs of semantic motivation, which is why they appear to physicians as new, artificially constructed lexical units.

Signs of motivation in names

Despite the abundance of unmotivated neologisms, three groups of drugs whose names retain a semantic connection can be distinguished in pharmaceutical terminology.

1. Anatomical or physiological nature. Include roots indicating an organ or process: Venitan (from Lat. vena — vein), Pulmex (from Lat. pulmo — lung), Corgard (from Lat. cor — heart), Prododerm (from Greek derma — skin), Febichol (from Greek chole — bile), Uracton (from Greek uron — urine).
2. Pharmacotherapeutic action. Reflect the therapeutic effect: antihypertensive Tensidomin (from Lat. tensio — pressure), anticoagulant Antithrombinum (from Greek thrombos — clot), laxative Laxatin (from Lat. laxativum), antifungal Funginal (from Lat. fungus — fungus), estrogen preparations Orto-gynest (from Greek gyne — woman) and Ovestin (from Lat. ovum — egg).
3. Source of origin. They indicate animal or plant raw materials: Senade is made from senna (Senna), Vincapanum from periwinkle alkaloids (Vinca), Thymolinum from the thymus gland (thymus), Spleninum from the spleen (splen), and Apilacum contains royal jelly (from Lat. apis — bee and lac — milk).

Unmotivated words and abbreviations

A huge layer of commercial nomenclature consists of words that do not carry a clear semantic load. As a rule, they hint at the synthetic chemical origin of the substance. Pharmacists take the original chemical name and create a compound-shortened word (abbreviation) from it through an arbitrary combination or rearrangement of syllables.

Such names often contain repeating sound complexes — frequency segments. They may conceal anatomical or therapeutic information and act as term elements.

Relationship between INNs and commercial brands

The same active substance, having a single International Nonproprietary Name (INN), can be sold under dozens of different commercial synonyms. For example, the INN Diclofenacum is available in pharmacies as Bioran, Veral, Votrex, Olfen or Feloran. Another example is Nifedipinum, which is marketed under the brands Adalat, Nifelat, Gipernal i Zenusin. The patented brand name is always marked with the symbol ® in superscript (for example, Cavinton®).

Briefly: answers to topical questions

Class and exam questions

What else to study on this topic

• Frequency segments and their meanings in pharmaceutical nomenclature
• Principles of abbreviation formation from systematic chemical names
• Difference between original drugs and generics
• Rules for writing prescriptions using commercial names

Other topics in the "Dosage Forms" section

Prepared by WhiteCoat Pro faculty in accordance with the medical school curriculum. For educational purposes only.