About PlainMeds
PlainMeds turns the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's public medicine files, and the pharmacy prices CMS publishes, into one record per medicine: what its label says, who makes it, whether a generic exists, what pharmacies pay, whether it is in shortage or was recalled, and what has been reported to the FDA. It holds 2,117 medicine records, drawing on 2,165 FDA labels, and keeps 3 more for medicines no longer listed.
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Who publishes PlainMeds?
PlainMeds belongs to Kiznis Studio, a small independent data-engineering studio based in Lithuania that runs a set of reference sites, each about one subject and built from that subject's own public sources. The studio has one operator, who builds the sites with AI tools and answers for what they publish: the figures, the wording and every correction.
Mail sent to hello@plainmeds.com reaches that operator, in the role of data editor, who checks each reported error against the FDA or CMS file it came from.
What is on the site?
A record for each medicine on the FDA's list of marketed human drugs, grouped by active ingredient, so that every brand and generic of the same medicine shares one page. Each record quotes the FDA label (what it is approved for, any boxed warning, the most common adverse reactions), lists the companies that market it, gives its first approval and its first generic, the patents and exclusivity periods in the Orange Book, what pharmacies paid for it in the latest National Average Drug Acquisition Cost (NADAC) survey, its shortage and recall history, and how many reports name it in the FDA Adverse Event Reporting System (FAERS).
Around the records: 7,576 pairs of medicines where one FDA label names the other, with the labels' own sentences and an interaction checker; side-by-side comparisons; medicines labeled for the same conditions; drug classes, conditions and DEA schedules; the current shortages and recalls; and original analyses with their data to download.
How can you check a figure?
Under every section that shows a figure sits a line naming the file it came from and the date it was read, and the label sections name the label's version and link it on DailyMed, the National Library of Medicine's label library, where the full text can be read. The methodology describes each file, how the files are joined and what each cannot tell you.
How is it made?
A scripted pipeline loads the FDA and CMS files into one database, matches products, labels, applications, prices, shortages and recalls to the medicine they belong to, and draws each page from that medicine's own records. Kiznis Studio uses AI tools to write the code, the page designs, the guides and the write-ups of the analyses; the numbers and the quoted label text come straight from the files, never from a model.
What is PlainMeds not?
It is not a pharmacy, does not sell or prescribe medicines, and is not part of, or endorsed by, the FDA, CMS or any drug company. It does not grade interactions or say which medicine is better. Nothing on it is medical advice: ask a pharmacist or a prescriber before starting, stopping or combining medicines. The disclaimer says more.
Who pays for it?
Advertising served by Google AdSense pays for the site. Advertisers, drug companies among them, have no say over what a page shows, and no medicine is listed or ordered for money. The privacy page lists every tool that runs on the site.
How do you report an error?
Write to hello@plainmeds.com with the page and what looks wrong. How reports are handled, and the list of fixed errors, is in the editorial policy.