irishspirit
17th December 2010, 16:36
No longer will worried patients have to rely on reporters to expose doctors on the payroll of the drug industry. Now patients can do it themselves. With a few simple keystrokes, anyone with a computer can search the "Dollars for Docs" database to see how much money their doctor is getting from pharma.
For decades pharmaceutical companies have given doctors gifts and money as ways of getting them to prescribe their drugs. During the flush 1990s, companies began ramping up these gifts dramatically -- entertaining doctors at expensive restaurants, sending them to conferences in exotic locations, even writing checks disguised as "unrestricted educational grants."
When PhRMA, the pharmaceutical industry trade group, began cracking down on these gifts in 2002 in response to public criticism, the influence game began to take another shape. Today, pharmaceutical companies influence doctors by inviting them to be paid speakers or consultants -- or as the companies call them, "thought leaders."
The amount of money paid to a thought leader can be considerable. For example, Dr. Charles Nemeroff, the former chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at Emory University, earned $2.8 million as a speaker and consultant for drug companies from 2000 to 2007. Dr. Joseph Biederman of Harvard University earned $1.6 million during the same period, and failed to disclose most of it to Harvard officials.
http://edition.cnn.com/2010/OPINION/11/30/elliott.doctors.drug.pay/index.html?iref=allsearch
For decades pharmaceutical companies have given doctors gifts and money as ways of getting them to prescribe their drugs. During the flush 1990s, companies began ramping up these gifts dramatically -- entertaining doctors at expensive restaurants, sending them to conferences in exotic locations, even writing checks disguised as "unrestricted educational grants."
When PhRMA, the pharmaceutical industry trade group, began cracking down on these gifts in 2002 in response to public criticism, the influence game began to take another shape. Today, pharmaceutical companies influence doctors by inviting them to be paid speakers or consultants -- or as the companies call them, "thought leaders."
The amount of money paid to a thought leader can be considerable. For example, Dr. Charles Nemeroff, the former chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at Emory University, earned $2.8 million as a speaker and consultant for drug companies from 2000 to 2007. Dr. Joseph Biederman of Harvard University earned $1.6 million during the same period, and failed to disclose most of it to Harvard officials.
http://edition.cnn.com/2010/OPINION/11/30/elliott.doctors.drug.pay/index.html?iref=allsearch