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Study finds marketing affects prescribing behavior
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BOSTON – Optometrists earned more than $18 million in 2014 as a result of financial relationships with the medical industry, according to a study presented here at Optometry’s Meeting.
Erik Mothersbaugh, OD, and colleagues evaluated the effects of the Physician Payments Sunshine Act of 2010, which requires that payments from industry to physicians to be reported.
According to the researchers, studies have consistently exhibited that industry promotion does influence prescribing behavior, even when physicians claim they are unaffected.
The retrospective review examined all de-identified publicly available data.
The researchers hypothesized that increasing awareness and understanding of these financial relationships can improve patient care.
Each industry-to-physician transaction is publicly available on the CMS Open Payments Website. “This provides transparency beyond that of previous policies and may provide insight into the patterns and nature of these relationships,” researchers wrote in the poster.
The first mandatory reporting period covered the end of 2013, and the second reporting period, which covered 2014, became available on July 1, 2015, according to researchers.
A total of 165,035 transactions were paid to optometrists in 2014, which amounted to
$18,289,816.66, with an average transaction value of $110.82. Of this total, more than $13 million was received by the top 10% of payment recipients, they reported.
Those in California, Texas, Pennsylvania, Florida, North Carolina received the most, while those in Vermont, Montana, Delaware, Maine and South Dakota received the least, on average.
The researchers said that even small gifts have influence and they recommend using these findings as a reference when developing policies to eliminate potential conflicts of interest.
“The evidence is very clear that when industry marketing takes place it does affect prescribing behavior,” Mothersbaugh said in a press conference featuring the top posters from the conference.
“But when you ask doctors...few think that it creates a conflict of interest; about 60% think it doesn’t. They think it doesn’t affect their own decision making. Some are willing to admit a conflict of interest exists, but not many. The classic mentality is that each of us individually is somehow the exception,” he added. – by Abigail Sutton
Reference:
Mothersbaugh E. The Sunshine Act First Year Results: The Status of Optometry. Presented at: Optometry’s Meeting; June 29 – July 2, 2016; Boston.
Disclosure: The researchers reported no relevant financial disclosures.