August 20, 2016

Association between payments from manufacturers of pharmaceuticals to physicians and regional prescribing: cross sectional ecological study.

When pharmaceutical companies pay specialists to speak and consult, the result is increased prescribing of those drugs in the physicians geographical region. BMJ. 2016 Aug 18;354:i4189.

Comment: Payments for educational materials was not associated with increased prescribing of the pharmaceutical being marketed, perhaps because of stringent rules placed upon printed material. Speakers, however, has much more leeway and this study found that paying them to speak about the pharmaceutical being marketed paid off, in that the result was more prescribing of that drug.