Updated Estimates of Pharmaceutical Company Payments to Physicians in Vermont
- Joseph S. Ross, MD, MHS joseph.ross@mssm.eduDepartment of Geriatrics and Adult DevelopmentMount Sinai School of MedicineNew York, New York;
- Alexander G. Nazem, BSYale University School of MedicineNew Haven, Connecticut;
- Peter Lurie, MD, MPHHealth Research GroupPublic CitizenWashington, DC;
- Josh E. Lackner, BSUniversity of Minnesota School of MedicineMinneapolis;
- Harlan M. Krumholz, MD, SMDepartment of MedicineYale University School of Medicine
Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text.
To the Editor: We previously examined the experiences of Vermont and Minnesota with state laws requiring that pharmaceutical companies disclose payments to health care professionals.1 However, in Vermont, companies were permitted to designate payments as trade secrets, preventing their inclusion in our study. Public Citizen subsequently obtained disclosed trade-secret–designated payments through litigation against the companies. We present updated findings and comparison of trade-secret– and non–trade-secret–designated payments.
Methods
Our methods have been described previously.1 Vermont law requires disclosure of payments of $25 or more.2 We categorized each payment by recipient and purpose; recipient names were typically not disclosed as part of the settlement. We conducted a descriptive analysis, summarizing all payments over the study period stratified by whether or not they were initially designated trade secret. We focused on payments of $100 or more because these exceed guidelines by the American Medical Association and Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of …
