crooked bastiches. This is only the tip of the iceberg
Financial ties link some docs, drug companies
Minn. law shines light into money big pharma spends on panel members
ST. PAUL Minn. - A groundbreaking Minnesota law is shining a rare light into the big money that drug companies spend on members of state advisory panels who help select which drugs are used in Medicaid programs for the poor and disabled.
Those panels, most comprised of physicians, hold great sway over the $28 billion spent on drugs each year for Medicaid patients nationwide. But aside from Minnesota, only Vermont and Maine require drug companies to report payments to doctors for lectures, consulting, research and other services.
An Associated Press review of records in Minnesota found that a doctor and a pharmacist on the eight-member state panel simultaneously got big checks more than $350,000 to one from pharmaceutical companies for speaking about their products.
Story continues below ↓advertisement
The two members said the money did not influence their work on the panel, and the lack of recorded votes in meeting minutes makes it difficult to track any link between the payments and policy.
But ethical experts said the Minnesota data raise questions about the possibility of similar financial ties between the pharmaceutical industry and advisers in other states.
'No way to know'
In the absence of disclosure laws, theres certainly no way to know, said Jack Hoadley, a research professor specializing in Medicaid at Georgetown University in Washington. There are a lot of physicians in general who have at least some contract or grant funding out of pharmaceutical companies, and additional (who) do speaking engagements.
The AP began looking at the records in mid-June. Soon after, the Minnesota Medicaid Drug Formulary Committee began considering a conflict-of-interest policy that would require members to disclose such financial relationships and recuse themselves from voting in some cases. The committee is expected to act on the policy next month.
John E. Simon, a psychiatrist appointed to the panel in 2004, earned more than $350,000 from drug companies between 2004 and 2006. Pharmacist Robert Straka served from 2000 to 2006 and collected $78,000 from various drug makers during that time.
Both men, and the committee chairman, said the payments did not influence their work with the committee.
But state officials said they would examine the panels past actions for any bias tied to the payments, and they will start screening appointees to more than two dozen advisory councils for similar links to the drug industry.
They will also require the Drug Formulary Committee to begin recording how each member votes at its meetings.
The Minnesota advisory panels recommendations to the state Human Services Department are almost always followed. The committee guided $240 million in spending on drugs for 202,000 patients last year. Thats slightly less than a third of all the states Medicaid patients mostly disabled and mentally ill people whose medical bills are paid directly by the state.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20379563/
