The information thus obtained is the focus of a front page report in The New
York Times. The accompanying graphic provides a Birdseye view of the highest trafficking
medical specialties who are debasing their profession–we call it,
prostituting for drug business.

Dr. Richard Grimm of the Berman Center for Outcomes and Clinical Research in
Minneapolis, has twice served on government-sponsored hypertension panels
that create guidelines about when to prescribe blood pressure pills. Last
year, he served on a National Kidney Foundation panel that wrote guidelines
about when kidney patients should be given cholesterol pills.

Guidelines that suggest greater use of these drugs would be a huge boon to
Pfizer who makes both Lipitor, a cholesterol drug, and Norvasc, a
hypertension drug. The Times reports that between 1997 and 2005, Dr. Grimm
earned more than $798,000 from drug companies:  In 2003 alone, Pfizer paid
Dr. Grimm more than $231,000: Lipitor sales that last year had $12.9
billion, more than any other drug in the world.; and Norvasc had sales last
year of $4.9 billion.

"Drug companies are like lions," Dr. Grimm said of his sponsored talks. "For
lions, it's their nature to kill zebras and eat them. For drug companies,
it's their nature to make money. They're not really trying to improve
anybody's health except if it makes them money.

"On your side, you're making a bit of money, but you're also trying to
educate the doctors."
Doctors are already being "educated" by drug companies and their physician
hustlers –and that is precisely what has turned medicine into a profession
of ill repute!

The Times graphic illustration shows that drug company fees for physician
marketing services increased by leaps and bounds beginning in 1997.

Topping off the chart among medical specialties is psychiatry.
In Minnesota 550 psychiatrists raked in $6.7 million. Next competitor
specialty is internal medicine ($5.2 million) followed by cardiology ($3.7
million)

"A Silent Quid Pro Quo" is inherent in drug company financed physicians'
lectures. Gene Carbona, a former Merck sales manager explains:
"You're making him money in several ways. You're paying him for the talk.
You're increasing his referral base so he's getting more patients. And
you're helping to develop his name." In return, physicians on the take write
more prescriptions for products of the paying company.

For anyone who is in doubt about whether marketing lectures by physicians
are a debasement of medicine:
The Times quotes a Minnesota doctor, Dr. Eric Storvick,  who reportedly made
more than $174,000 between 1998 and 2005 from drug kick backs:

"It [lecturing for drug companies] beats talking to little old ladies about
their bowels."

Since the medical establishment seems to have no shame, public policy must
rein in the licensure of these imposters who have debased a noble
profession.

Contact: Vera Hassner Sharav
212-595-8974
veracare@ahrp.org
 
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/21/us/21drug.html
THE NEW YORK TIMES
 March 21, 2007
Doctors' Ties to Drug Makers Are Put on Close View
By GARDINER HARRIS and JANET ROBERTS

Dr. Allan Collins may be the most influential kidney specialist in the
country. He is president of the National Kidney Foundation and director of a
government-financed research center on kidney disease.
In 2004, the year he was chosen as president-elect of the kidney foundation,
the pharmaceutical company Amgen, which makes the most expensive drugs used
in the treatment of kidney disease, underwrote more than $1.9 million worth
of research and education programs led by Dr. Collins, according to records
examined by The New York Times. In 2005, Amgen paid Dr. Collins at least
$25,800, mostly in consulting and speaking fees, the records show.

The payments to Dr. Collins and the research center appear in an unusual set
of records. They come from Minnesota, the first of a handful of states to
pass a law requiring drug makers to disclose payments to doctors. The
Minnesota records are a window on the widespread financial ties between
pharmaceutical companies and the doctors who prescribe and recommend their
products. Patient advocacy groups and many doctors themselves have long
complained that drug companies exert undue influence on doctors, but the
extent of such payments has been hard to quantify.

The Minnesota records begin in 1997. From then through 2005, drug makers
paid more than 5,500 doctors, nurses and other health care workers in the
state at least $57 million. Another $40 million went to clinics, research
centers and other organizations. More than 20 percent of the state's
licensed physicians received money. The median payment per consultant was
$1,000; more than 100 people received more than $100,000.
Doctors receive money typically in return for delivering lectures about
drugs to other doctors. Some of the doctors receiving the most money sit on
committees that prepare guidelines instructing doctors nationwide about when
to use medicines. Dr. Collins, who received more money than anyone else in
the state, is among a limited number whose payments financed research.

In dozens of interviews, most doctors said that these payments had no effect
on their care of patients.
Dr. Collins said his sole focus was the health and well-being of patients.
"Just because I might do consulting work doesn't mean I don't press the
agenda of the public health," he said.
Ken Johnson, senior vice president of Pharmaceutical Research and
Manufacturers of America, said interactions between drug companies and
doctors were beneficial. "In the end, patients are well-served when
technically trained pharmaceutical research company representatives work
with health care professionals to make sure medicines are used properly," he said.

There is nothing illegal about doctors' accepting money for marketing talks,
and professional organizations have largely ignored the issue.
But research shows that doctors who have close relationships with drug
makers tend to prescribe more, newer and pricier drugs – whether or not they
are in the best interests of patients.

"When honest human beings have a vested stake in seeing the world in a
particular way, they're incapable of objectivity and independence," said Max
H. Bazerman, a professor at Harvard Business School. "A doctor who
represents a pharmaceutical company will tend to see the data in a slightly
more positive light and as a result will overprescribe that company's drugs."

In an e-mail message, Dr. Collins said he personally received in 2004 less
than $10,000 from Amgen for educational presentations. "The contract amount
of $1.9 million from Amgen was paid to the Minneapolis Medical Research
Foundation (MMRF) for the research contract, on which I am the designated
senior researcher," Dr. Collins wrote. He wrote that he did not work for or
serve on the board of directors of the foundation. Dr. Collins discloses on
his Web site and research papers that he is a consultant to Amgen, among
other companies.

Dan Whelan, an Amgen spokesman, said the company paid the Minneapolis
Medical Research Foundation "to conduct sophisticated research and data
analyses that have enhanced the understanding of health care delivery" for
kidney patients.

But Dr. Daniel Coyne, a kidney specialist at Washington University, said he
was troubled by the payments.
"Amgen's funding for Dr. Collins's MMRF is another huge financial connection
to individuals at the National Kidney Foundation," Dr. Coyne said. "The
foundation's recent pro-industry anemia  guidelines – and the revisions due
next month – have to be viewed with great skepticism."
Dr. Coyne recently wrote an editorial in an influential journal decrying
guidelines written last year by the kidney foundation that encourage doctors
to use more of Amgen's drugs to treat anemia in kidney patients despite
studies showing that increased use led to more deaths.

Ellie Schlam, a spokeswoman for the National Kidney Foundation, said the
foundation sought out the world's foremost experts. "These are the same
people that are wanted by government and industry," she said. "We really
work hard to separate the financing from the content."
Drug makers listed Dr. Collins and the research group as the recipient of
payments totaling more than $2 million between 1997 and 2005. Most doctors
on the list are far less prominent than Dr. Collins.

Ten doctors and one dentist in Minnesota received more than $500,000.
Because the records are incomplete, these sums likely underestimate the
providers' earnings. Device makers and Wall Street firms tracking medical
research were not required to report, although consulting arrangements
between such companies and doctors are common.

More than 250 Minnesota psychiatrists together earned $6.7 million in drug
company money – more than any other specialty. Seven of the last eight
presidents of the Minnesota Psychiatric Society have served as consultants
to drug makers, according to the Times examination.

After psychiatrists, doctors who specialized in internal medicine garnered
the most money, followed by cardiologists, endocrinologists and
neurologists.

Unknown to Most Patients
Doctors in Minnesota said they generally did not tell their patients about
these arrangements. Indeed, few patients are aware of the financial
connections between those prescribing drugs and the companies making them.  

A New York Times/CBS News poll last month found that 85 percent of
respondents thought it "not acceptable" for doctors to be paid by drug
companies to comment on prescription drugs. Eighty-five percent also said
such payments would influence the decisions that doctors made about patient
care.

In addition to Minnesota, legislators in Vermont, Maine, West Virginia,
California and the District of Columbia have passed laws requiring some
level of disclosure of drug company marketing efforts. In Vermont, the state
has collected three years of data on payments to doctors, but drug makers
are allowed to keep the records private by declaring them trade secrets.

In the 2005 fiscal year, the most recent year for which figures are available, drug makers declared 73 percent of payments to doctors in Vermont as trade secrets.

The Journal of the American Medical Association today is
publishing data summarizing physician payments from drug makers in Minnesota
and Vermont. The study concludes that many payments exceeding $100 were made
but that the records were difficult to decipher and all but impossible for
individuals in either state to interpret.

Dr. David Blumenthal, director of the Institute for Health Policy at
Massachusetts General Hospital , said, "We have given physicians a lot of
freedom and self-governance because of their professional reputation and a
sense that they know how to help their patients."
Doctors said their lectures about drugs to other doctors in return for the
payments were gentle marketing pitches that adhered strictly to messages
approved by drug makers and federal drug regulators.

Drug companies "want somebody who can manipulate in a very subtle way," said
Dr. Frederick R. Taylor, a headache specialist in Minneapolis who earned
more than $710,000 between 1997 and 2005, much of that from GlaxoSmithKline,
the maker of the migraine drug Imitrex.
Dr. George Realmuto, a psychiatrist from the University of Minnesota , said
most of the marketing associated with his lectures was packaged around his talks.
"It's at a wonderful restaurant, the atmosphere is very conducive to a
positive attitude toward the drug, and everyone is having a good time," said
Dr. Realmuto, who compared the experience to that of buying a car in a
glitzy showroom. He earned at least $20,000 between 2002 and 2004 from drug
makers.

Doctors said that lectures were highly educational, and that drug makers
hired them for their medical expertise and speaking skills. But former drug
company sales representatives said they hired doctors as speakers mostly in
hope of influencing that doctor's prescribing habits.
"The vast majority of the time that we did any sort of paid relationship
with a physician, they increased the use of our drug," said Kathleen
Slattery-Moschkau, a former sales representative for Bristol-Myers Squibb
and Johnson & Johnson who left the industry in 2002. "I hate to say it out
loud, but it all comes down to ways to manipulate the doctors."

Jamie Reidy, a drug sales representative for Pfizer Inc. and Eli Lilly &
Company who was fired in 2005 after writing a humorous book about his
experiences, said drug makers seduced doctors with escalating financial
inducements that often start with paid trips to learn about a drug.
"If a doctor says that he got flown to Maui, stayed at the Four Seasons –
and it didn't influence him a bit? Please," Mr. Reidy said.

'A Silent Quid Pro Quo'
The lectures earn doctors more than cash.
"You're making him money in several ways," said Gene Carbona, who left Merck
as a regional sales manager in 2001. "You're paying him for the talk. You're
increasing his referral base so he's getting more patients. And you're
helping to develop his name. The hope in all this is that a silent quid quo
pro is created. I've done so much for you, the only thing I need from you is
that you write more of my products."

For many doctors, marketing lectures are also a welcome diversion.
"It beats talking to little old ladies about their bowels," said Dr. Eric
Storvick of Mankato, Minn., who made more than $174,000 between 1998 and
2005 from drug makers.

The number of drug marketing presentations delivered by doctors across the
United States rose nearly threefold between 1998 and 2006, according to
Verispan, a company that tracks drug marketing efforts.
In some cases, consulting doctors are so well recognized that they offer
drug makers far more than the chance to influence their own prescriptions.
For drug makers, among the most prized consultants are those who write
guidelines instructing their peers about how to use drugs.

Drug Companies' Nature
This list of top doctors in Minnesota includes Dr. Richard Grimm of the
Berman Center for Outcomes and Clinical Research in Minneapolis, who has
twice served on government-sponsored hypertension  panels that create
guidelines about when to prescribe blood pressure pills. Last year, he
served on a National Kidney Foundation panel that wrote guidelines about
when kidney patients should be given cholesterol  pills.

Between 1997 and 2005, Dr. Grimm earned more than $798,000 from drug
companies, according to records. In 2003 alone, Pfizer paid Dr. Grimm more
than $231,000. Pfizer markets Lipitor, a cholesterol drug that last year had
$12.9 billion in sales, more than any other drug in the world. It also
markets Norvasc, a hypertension drug that last year had $4.9 billion in
sales. Guidelines that suggest greater use of these drugs would be a huge
boon to Pfizer.

"Drug companies are like lions," Dr. Grimm said of his sponsored talks. "For
lions, it's their nature to kill zebras and eat them. For drug companies,
it's their nature to make money. They're not really trying to improve
anybody's health except if it makes them money.
"On your side, you're making a bit of money, but you're also trying to
educate the doctors. And in my view, the doctors need a lot of educating."
Dr. Grimm said that he contributed more than $50,000 between 1997 and 2005
to the Minneapolis Medical Research Foundation, and that his lectures were
not biased.

Dr. Donald Hunninghake served on a government-sponsored advisory panel that
wrote guidelines for when people should get cholesterol-lowering pills. The
panel's 2004 recommendations that far more people get the drugs became
controversial when it was revealed that eight of nine members had financial
ties to drug makers. The full extent of those ties have never been revealed.
In 1998 alone, Pfizer paid Dr. Hunninghake $147,000, and he earned at least
$420,800 from drug makers between 1997 and 2003. He left the University of
Minnesota in 2004 to become a full-time industry consultant. He is now
retired.
"Most of my talks did not relate to drugs but the guidelines for treatment,"
Dr. Hunninghake said. He said his consulting practice included a variety of
activities, including lectures.

A 2002 survey found that more than 80 percent of the doctors on panels that
write clinical practice guidelines had financial ties to drug makers.
"It is critical that the experts who write clinical guidelines be prohibited
from having any conflicts of interest," said Dr. Marcia Angell, a former
editor of The New England Journal of Medicine. "Since they have no data
themselves but are just making judgments based on their expertise, they
absolutely must be impartial or it undermines the whole enterprise."
 
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company <http://www.nytco.com/> 

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