Monthly Archives: October 2010

Top prescribers under Senate’s microscope

Minnesota doctors are again under the microscope of an influential U.S. senator from Iowa — this time because of concerns that expensive medications are being overprescribed at great cost to the publicly funded Medicaid and Medicare programs. U.S. Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, notified federal authorities Wednesday that he found potential examples of overprescribing after requesting lists from states, including Minnesota, of doctors who issued the most prescriptions for antipsychotic and narcotic medications in 2008 and 2009.

Top 50 Psychiatrists Paid by Pharmaceutical Companies

by John M Grohol, PsyD – Who were the top 50 psychiatrists in the U.S. paid by the top seven pharmaceutical companies? This past week, ProPublica, an independent, non-profit newsroom that produces investigative journalism in the public interest, recently decided to answer that question by compiling a list of 384 physicians and health care providers who earned more than $100,000 total from one or more of the seven companies that have disclosed payments in 2009 and early 2010. We combed that list and found the top 50 psychiatry earners for the past two years (2009-2010).

Jury took little more than three hours to decide antipsychotic drug maker sent out false & misleading information

“Under Louisiana’s Medical Assistance Program Integrity Law (MAPIL), anyone who attempted to defraud or cause false and misleading information to disseminate, you are subject to civil monetary fine,” says Morrow. According to the evidence, Janssen made some 27,000 phone sales calls to doctors and sent hundreds of “dear doctor letters” downplaying the diabetes link to Risperdal.

Psychiatrists Dominate “Doctor-Dollars” Database Listing Big Pharma Payments

Dollar Value of Psychiatric Drugs Is Enormous— The preponderance of psychiatrists on the ProPublica list may reflect the proportion of prescription activity involving psychiatric drugs. In 2009, the dollar value of antipsychotic drugs came to $14.6 billion, topping all other therapeutic classes, according to research firm IMS Health. Antidepressants occupied the number 4 spot on the list, valued at $9.9 billion. IMS Health put the total US prescription market in 2009 at $300.3 billion.
Carol Bernstein, MD, president of the American Psychiatric Association, told Medscape Medical News that the thorny issue of pharmaceutical industry compensation went beyond her specialty.

Psychiatrists Are Major Target for Drug-Maker Money

Earlier this week, NPR and ProPublica released a database showing the flow of money from seven top drug makers to the doctors who prescribe those drugs. WFAE’s Julie Rose takes a closer look at one type of doctor getting a big slice of that money. Psychiatrists are only about 7 percent of all doctors in the country, according to a 2008 survey funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. But when you look at the doctors who made more than $100,000 consulting and speaking on behalf of major drug companies in the last 18 months, psychiatrists are more than a quarter of the list.