The Magazine of Corporate Responsibility

Tag Archive for ‘Doctors’

Drug Companies Reduce Payments to Doctors as Scrutiny Mounts

Following an investigation by ProPublica of payments made by drug companies to doctors, some of the nation’s top medical schools last year cracked down on professors who give paid promotional talks for drugmakers. The firms themselves cut back on such spending in the wake of mounting scrutiny.

The Champion of Painkillers

Overdoses caused by narcotics painkillers now kill nearly 15,000 people a year — more than heroin and cocaine combined. But the pills continue to have a champion in the American Pain Foundation, which describes itself as the U.S.’s largest advocacy group for pain patients. Its message: The risk of addiction is overblown, and the drugs are underused. What the nonprofit doesn’t highlight is the money behind that message.

Economists Lack Ethics Code, Posing Challenges for Journalists

Unlike doctors, architects, dentists, building contractors, journalists and a wide range of other professions and trades, economists do not have a code of professional ethics. That would seem more of an internal matter for the profession if it weren’t for the fact that journalists rely on academic and applied economists as sources.

Doctors Avoid Penalties in Suits Against Medical Firms

At least 15 drug and medical-device companies have paid $6.5 billion since 2008 to settle accusations of marketing fraud or kickbacks. However, none of the more than 75 doctors named as participants were sanctioned, despite allegations of fraud or of conduct that put patients at risk, a review by ProPublica found.

More Scrutiny for Doctors Profiting From Medical Devices

Five U.S. senators are calling for an investigation into a system that gives surgeons a financial stake in the devices they use on their patients. The inquiry comes after a Wall Street Journal investigation of Dr. Vishal James Makker, a surgeon with a questionable track record for performing multiple spinal operations on his patients.

Financial Ties Bind Medical Societies to Drug Makers

From the time they arrived to the moment they laid their heads on hotel pillows, the thousands of cardiologists attending this week’s Heart Rhythm Society conference in San Francisco have been bombarded with pitches for drugs and medical devices. Who arranged this commercial barrage? The society itself, which sold access to its members and their purchasing power.

Docs on Pharma Payroll Have Blemished Records

Drug companies say they hire the most-respected doctors in their fields for the critical task of teaching about the benefits and risks of their drugs. But an investigation by ProPublica uncovered hundreds of doctors on company payrolls who had been accused of professional misconduct, were disciplined by state boards or lacked credentials as researchers or specialists.

Medical Groups Set New Ethics Code for Dealing with Industry

The code provides guidance “on appropriate interactions with for-profit companies in the health care sector,” and seeks to ensure that societies’ interactions with companies “are independent and transparent.” Thirteen medical societies have already formally adopted the code.