Pfizer To Disclose All Payments Over $500 Made To Medical Personnel Who Prescribe Drugs

Main Category: Pharma Industry / Biotech Industry
Also Included In: Primary Care / General Practice;  Public Health
Article Date: 11 Feb 2009 - 6:00 PDT

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Pfizer on Monday announced plans to begin to report certain payments to physicians and other medical personnel as the pharmaceutical industry "has come under fresh fire for its undue influence and could face toughened legislation," the Wall Street Journal reports (Johnson, Wall Street Journal, 2/10). As part of the new policy, Pfizer next year will begin to disclose all payments of more than $500 to physicians, physician assistants, nurses and other medical personnel who can prescribe medications.

Pfizer also will disclose payments to universities and research centers involved in clinical trials. Under the policy, Pfizer will disclose payments to physicians who work on trials, write reports for medical journals and provide other support for efforts to have experimental medications approved by regulators. Pfizer also will disclose non-financial gifts -- such as meals, travel expenses, textbooks and anatomical models -- to physicians (Johnson, AP/Houston Chronicle, 2/9). Pfizer will disclose the payments and gifts on the company's Web site (Pettypiece, Bloomberg, 2/9).

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Pfizer CEO Jeffrey Kindler said, "It's very important that we earn the trust of patients and the public," adding, "People ... have come to various misapprehensions about what these payments are about" (AP/Houston Chronicle, 2/9). In a statement, Kindler also defended the relationship between Pfizer and physicians. "These collaborations are an essential part of medical progress," he said (Wall Street Journal, 2/10).

Senate Finance Committee ranking member Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who last month introduced a bill (S 301) that would require pharmaceutical and medical device companies to annually disclose to HHS payments and gifts to physicians of $100 or more, praised the announcement by Pfizer. In a statement, he said, "There's so much public money and public trust at stake with the financial relationships between the pharmaceutical industry on one end and the practice of medicine on the other end, that the public has a right to know what those relationships are," adding, "Every step in the direction of disclosure is a step in the right direction and helps to build the case for passage of legislation to establish nationwide reporting of this kind of information" (AP/Houston Chronicle, 2/9).

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