Healthy Skepticism Library item: 16516

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Publication type: news

Johnson LA
GlaxoSmithKline changes doctor training policy
Associated Press 2009 Sep 21
http://www.memphisdailynews.com/editorial/ArticleEmail.aspx?id=44924

Full text:

GlaxoSmithKline bans political donations, alters spending rules on doctor training, consulting

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — British drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline PLC said Monday it is making major changes in its funding of educational programs for doctors, reducing the number it sponsors and switching its focus to independent ones with balanced information.

The change follows similar moves by some major competitors — possibly concerned about proposed federal rules that could be tougher — and a ban Glaxo instituted this year on all corporate political contributions worldwide.

The key change announced Monday involves an end to funding educational programs run by commercial medical education and communication companies. Some have been found to help drug companies by ghostwriting research articles on their drugs for medical journals and getting respected academic researchers to claim to be the primary authors.

Medical education programs often promote a drugmaker’s new, generally expensive drug and give little information about its risks or whether it works better than older, cheaper drugs. The programs, generally offered at medical conferences at resorts, provide credits toward annual requirements doctors must meet to keep their training and medical license current.

Glaxo said it will now sponsor only programs given by national professional medical associations or teaching hospitals and their affiliates, who must seek grants from the company and be accredited. Glaxo will post all approved grants on a Web site, http://www.us-gsk.com.

“We will continue funding those with the greatest potential to improve patient health,” Deirdre Connolly, Glaxo’s president of North American Pharmaceuticals, said in a statement. “This is one more step in our efforts to be more transparent in the way we operate our business and interact with health care providers.”

Starting in the fourth quarter, the company will begin publishing fees it pays to health professionals for speaking at doctor dinner meetings, consulting services and the like.

The shift come as congressional investigators, consumer groups and the media ratchet up criticism over the increasing influence drug and medical device makers wield over the practice of medicine, particularly which drugs or devices patients get.

GSK is the world’s No. 4 drugmaker by annual revenue, according to drug data firm IMS Health.

Some other major drug companies have announced similar changes.

Top-ranked Pfizer Inc. of New York early next year will start to disclose all payments totaling $500 per year or more to doctors and other medical personnel who prescribe drugs, for consulting and other services and even testing experimental drugs in people.

Merck & Co. and Eli Lilly & Co. also have announced plans to disclose payments for consulting, giving speeches and similar services.

That step came after two senators introduced the Physician Payments Sunshine Act of 2009 to require such disclosures — and after revelations of astronomical industry payments to some doctors that were not revealed to universities and hospitals that employ them. Despite a number of such doctors being identified publicly, virtually none have lost their job or faced other repercussions.