Pharma Funding Under Scrutiny

A government watchdog will tell Congress this week that the pharmaceutical and medical device industries’ billion-dollar spending spree for medical education is threatening the judgment of physicians across the nation.  Almost all United States physicians need to take continuing education classes to maintain their medical certification. Professional societies like the American College of Cardiology and dozens of others sponsor conferences each year on the latest treatments.

Over the past 10 years, drug and device companies have risen their funding for such meetings by over 300 percent, according to industry figures. Companies now provide more than half of the $2.5 billion spent annually on medical education.

An inspector for the Department of Health and Human Services will tell Senate lawmakers today that stronger restrictions are required to maintain pharmaceutical companies from utilizing that money to drive physicians toward prescribing their drugs. While companies are not allowed to present at meetings, they can shape the discussions by contributing millions of dollars into select topics, according to the inspector.

The Senate Aging Committee will hear from a half-dozen other witnesses Wednesday, most of whom oppose industry funding for medical education. Committee Chairman Herb Kohl, D-Wis., is pushing a bill that would need companies to disclose all payments to physicians over $100. Kohl and co-sponsor Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, hope to include their Physician Payment Sunshine Act in the health care bill taking shape in the Senate, which has been slowed by price concerns.

The hearing comes as some of the most influential medical institutions begin turning away from company-funded medical education.

Earlier this year the American Medical Association said that medical education should ideally be funded by organizations that don’t have a financial stake in courting physicians — although it stopped short of suggesting a ban on industry money. In April, the government’s Institute of Medicine stated “a new system of funding” for medical education is required.

The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers Association said earlier this week that it has not taken a position on the idea.

“We’ve basically left it up to our individual member companies to make decisions about how they want to allocate resources,” stated Diana Bieri, the group’s general counsel. She pointed out that the group has already evaluated its voluntary guidelines to recommend companies keep their education departments distinct from their sales and marketing divisions, a distinct that currently didn’t exist at few companies.

The group’s members include Pfizer Inc., Merck & Co. Inc., Eli Lilly & Co. and most of the world’s other large pharmaceutical companies.

Whether companies will be willing to totally remove themselves from decisions about how their funds are used is not clarified.

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