A watchdog has criticised the drug company Ferring for five breaches of the United Kingdom’s drug advertising code, accusing it of misleading promotion of one of its products that omitted information about possible side effects.

Patients were also wrongly led to believe that they should ask their health professional to prescribe the gonadotrophin releasing hormone antagonist degarelix (sold as Firmagon), used to treat advanced prostate cancer, said the Prescription Medicines Code of Practice Authority in its newly issued ruling. The authority regulates the advertising code of the UK’s drug company representative body, the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry.

Ferring Pharmaceuticals employed a press relations agency to promote degarelix. It supplied an approved press release about the launch of degarelix to give to …