The Significant Physician Contribution to the Development of Medical Devices

Discussion The results of this study show that the relationship between large medical device companies and startups impacts patenting and product market innovation. The actual impact of legislation such as the Sunshine Act might transmit through multiple channels. First, the results show "that direct investment by the incumbent [manufacturer] in a startup is associated with greater use of the startup's patents (although not with a greater maximum information overlap between the startup's patents and the investor's PMAs). This suggests that curtailing investment activity in physician-founded startups might restrict large device companies' access to inventions that feed into their subsequent inventive process." The results do not establish causality; however, additional research will be necessary to establish the effect of investment on physician contributions. Second, the PMA approval process may be prohibitive for many startups to bring a device to market independently; however, some of the insights appear to reach fruition in the PMAs of the established device companies. The results suggest that physician-founded companies contribute disproportionately in this regard. Taken together, the results may help inform an increasingly nuanced debate on the role of physicians in medical innovation and the potential for conflicts of interest. As the implementation of Sunshine legislation begins, physicians have identified greater concerns about the impact on their ro...
Source: Policy and Medicine - Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Source Type: blogs