2024-04-16 12:57:43
Red in the morning, yellow at lunchtime, white in the evening – to make the tablets distinguishable, they have different colors. But that’s not the only reason.
One in four Germans takes three medications or more every day. Of German citizens over 65 years of age, 30 to 40 percent swallow at least four medications. From the age of 75 onwards, one in three people takes more than eight medications.
To better distinguish the tablets from each other, they have different shapes, sizes and colors. But there is much more behind the appearance of a tablet or capsule.
The choice of color for the cover is not a coincidence
Which color a manufacturer gives their product is of course up to them, but it is anything but random. Many tablets are plain white. Professor Georgios Imanidis, pharmaceutical technologist at the University of Life Sciences in northwestern Switzerland, explained on the druggist portal vitagate.ch: “This is because the active ingredients and excipients that make up the tablets are white. The manufacturers have to add other colors separately, by giving the tablet a coating.”
In addition to a different color, this coating has various other functions: it protects the product from light, moisture and oxygen, can mask bad taste or smooth the surface to make it easier to swallow.
The color of this coating often depends on the type of active ingredient. The background is various research results. Among other things, different colors were tested in placebo research.
To explain: With the placebo effect, a therapeutic effect occurs in the patient even though he or she has only received a dummy medication without any active ingredient. It turned out that the color of this fake medication plays a big role.
Blue has a calming effect, red has an activating effect
Blue pills are seen as calming or sleep-promoting, green tablets (without active ingredients) still reduced anxiety, red made you awake, yellow worked best in depressed patients.
This is the result of a meta-analysis published in 1996, in which the effects of 49 medications were examined. Result: “The studies on the perceived effects of colored medications showed that red, yellow and orange are associated with a stimulating effect, while blue and green are associated with a calming effect.”
The conclusion states somewhat cryptically: “Colors influence the perceived effect of a drug and appear to influence the effectiveness of a drug. Furthermore, there is a connection between the coloring of drugs that affect the central nervous system and the indications for which they are used .”
Translated: Depending on what the drug is used for or against, the color can be important for the perception of the effectiveness of the drug.
But then why is Viagra blue?
One of the most well-known drugs, Viagra, is known to be blue, but is said to be anything but calming. It is used as a sexual enhancer. The explanation for the unusual coloring is simple: the tablet was originally developed as a blood pressure lowering agent. However, it had no effect, but the side effect was an improvement in erectile function.
If the color or shape changes, things can get difficult
A study from 2014 showed how important the familiar shape and color are for the patient. It examined how well patients adhered to the prescribed therapy after a heart attack.
Of the more than 11,500 test subjects, 3,200 took medications whose color and/or shape changed during the observation period (although the active ingredient and its concentration remained the same). The result: 34 percent of patients whose medication changed color interrupted their therapy. Among study participants in whom the shape of the tablet changed, the figure was as high as 66 percent.