Drug, device lobbies back physician-gift disclosure bill

The pharmaceutical and medical device industries have reversed course and endorsed a Senate bill that would require them to disclose when they give gifts to physicians.

The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) and the Advanced Medical Technology Association (AdavMed) announced their support for the bill following revisions made by its authors, Senate Finance Committee ranking member Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Aging Committee Chairman Herb Kohl (D-Wis.).

{mosads}“If this legislation is passed, it will greatly change the way drugs are marketed in America by increasing transparency,” Kohl said.

Grassley and Kohl are responding to concerns that gifts, lunches and other considerations made by drug, device and supply companies create real and potential conflicts of interests for physicians, who might be influenced to prescribe products based on their relationships with their manufacturers.

In letters this week, PhRMA, AdvaMed, the pharmaceutical companies Merck and AstraZeneca, and the device company Medtronic announced their support for the bill.

“We believe such transparency can build trust and help patients better understand the basis for payments made to physicians by biopharmaceutical/device companies,” AstraZeneca President and CEO Anthony Zook wrote in a letter to Grassley and Kohl.

This cavalcade of endorsements follows the lead of the drug maker Eli Lilly & Co., which worked with Grassley and Kohl this year on the revisions and issued its endorsement last week.

“The kind of support that continues to grow from industry leaders contributes in an important way to achieving new nationwide requirements. Requiring disclosure of payments to doctors doesn’t mean that anything has to change, and if there’s nothing to hide, there’s no reason to worry,” Grassley said.

The bill would create a public database detailing when doctors get at least $500 in money or gifts from a single company during a year; gifts worth less than $25 would not be included. Penalties would range from $1,000 to $50,000 per violation, up to a $250,000 annual limit.

Under an earlier version of the bill that the industries did not support, any gift worth more than $25 would have triggered disclosure. Both versions of the bill exempt free samples for patient
use.

Perhaps the most important change from an industry perspective, however, is that the Grassley-Kohl bill would pre-empt any new or existing state “sunshine” laws, including those that might have tougher standards than the federal bill.