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PhRMA: JAMA article on payments to docs mixes apples and oranges

Pharma Compliance Alert, March 28, 2007

Last week's article in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) examining the process of disclosing physician gifts and payments from pharma mixes apples with oranges, says PhRMA Vice President Ken Johnson.

Johnson says in the report that the laws in Vermont and Minnesota and the JAMA article examining them erroneously combine the activities of pharmaceutical research company representatives who meet with healthcare professionals with separate physician contracts and grants to academic medical research centers.

The article, co-authored by the consumer group Public Citizen, concluded that there needs to be better public disclosure of the interactions between pharma and physicians. According to the study, the median payment to physicians in Vermont was $177. In Minnesota, the median payment was $1,000. Go to the JAMA Web site to read more about the study.

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