When i use a word... the languages of medicines - Umbrella terms

In the world of medicines, proprietary names are the brand names or trade names that pharmaceutical manufacturers give to their medicinal products. They are distinct from the generic names of the active ingredients they contain. Here I discuss the 2019 regulatory guidelines issued by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) in the UK and the 2020 guidelines, published by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), on the desiderata governing a manufacturer’s choice of a proprietary name for a medicinal product. I specifically highlight what the former calls an “umbrella segment,” defined as “a section of [an] invented name that is used in more than one medicinal name to create a brand or range of products,” and the latter a “brand name extension,” defined as “a naming strategy that uses a proprietary name that is already associated with one or more marketed drug products, with or without a modifier, for a product that does not share any active ingredient(s) or active moiety(ies) with the marketed product(s).” Umbrellas, originally intended to give shade from the sun and now more commonly used to give shelter from the rain, do not appear to give shelter from the possibility of medication errors through confusion of proprietary names of medicinal products. Simplification of the rules governing the formulation of these types of names would be welcome to consumers and healthcare professionals alike.