The Pervasiveness of Health Care Corruption as Shown by Another Roundup of Legal Settlements
Legal settlements are one way to document unethical and even corrupt behavior by large health care organizations, even if they may not deter bad behavior in the future. It is time for another roundup of settlements by large pharmaceutical and device companies, presented in alphabetical orderAbbott LaboratoriesThis one goes back to late December, 2013. As described in the Chattanoogan (from Tennessee):Abbott Laboratories, a global healthcare company, has agreed to pay $5.475 million to settle alleged violations of the False Claims Act, and other federal laws and regulations in connection with the operation of ...
Source: Health Care Renewal - April 30, 2014 Category: Health Management Tags: Abbott antitrust Baxter Endo Health Solutions fraud Hospira kickbacks legal settlements Neurontin Pfizer restraint of competition RICO Source Type: blogs
Disruption in medical education — Teaching the teachers via social media?
Everyone agrees that doctors should be informed and up-to-date. Perpetual medical education has always been a vital component of doctoring. But now, as the rapid pace of healthcare innovation pushes against the limits of biology, and really, our humanity, medical education gains even more importance. Doctors (and patients) must know what can and cannot be accomplished. We must know the evidence. And these days, evidence pours in.
Doctors are essentially teachers, and thus, a central question in medical education parallels that in regular education: What is the best means for teaching the teachers?
I’ve written before...
Source: Dr John M - April 26, 2014 Category: Cardiology Authors: Dr John Source Type: blogs
Murray Kopelow, MD to Retire after 20 Years as Chief Executive of ACCME
Dr. Murray Kopelow announced that he will retire as President and Chief Executive of the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) on July 31, 2015. Remarkably, Dr. Kopelow will have served as chief executive of the ACCME for over 20 years.
The timing of the announcement affords the ACCME more than a year to identify Dr. Kopelow's successor and implement the transition process. ACCME stated that they "will conduct a national search for Dr. Kopelow's successor. The ACCME will keep the CME and stakeholder community apprised of its progress."
Under Dr. Kopelow's guidance, the adoption and implementati...
Source: Policy and Medicine - March 21, 2014 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Thomas Sullivan Source Type: blogs
ACCME Webinar on Simplified Accreditation Requirements Summary, Release “Performance-in-Practice Structured Abstract”
The Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) hosted a webinar to discuss the recent changes to their accreditation process. A few weeks ago we wrote about ACCME's plan to simplify the accreditation requirements. This webinar outlined what our previous article covered: the specific changes to the accreditation requirements. ACCME has posted their updated Requirements and Descriptions document with notes about any changes. The webinar clarified that these changes are effective immediately. ACCME will not penalize companies who submit information that would have been out of compliance with the old standa...
Source: Policy and Medicine - March 18, 2014 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Thomas Sullivan Source Type: blogs
American Board of Internal Medicine Policy Condones Keeping Conflicts of Interest Secret
The latest complication of the CareFusion/ Dr Denham/ NQF/ Dr Cassel/ ABIM case was the revelation that the current president of the NQF, Dr Christine Cassel, after resigning her position on the board of directors of for-profit publicly held group purchasing organization Premier Inc, was found to have been on the board of for-profit privately held predecessor of Premier Inc since 2008 (see post here). Before Dr Cassel was CEO of NQF, she had been the president and CEO of the American Board of Internal Medicine for 10 years. So apparently she was on the board of the predecessor of Premier Inc for about five year...
Source: Health Care Renewal - March 6, 2014 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Tags: ABIM boards of directors conflicts of interest deception Dr Christine Cassel Premier Inc transparency Source Type: blogs
A matter of public trust
Conclusion I for one believe it would take a superhuman effort on the part of the Dean to recuse himself from every financial analysis, purchase decision, research decision, and educational decision at the University of Illinois that has the potential to involve Novartis or its competitors. As noted, I am in no way asserting or implying that this superb physician and researcher has improperly benefited or that he has failed to disclose under state law or University policy. What I am saying is that both institutions require a person to exercise a proper duty of care and loyalty to each of them. It is incon...
Source: Running a hospital - March 1, 2014 Category: Health Managers Source Type: blogs
Study Reveals Significant Practice Gaps for Oncologists Treating Renal Cell Carcinoma
Conclusions
"Not recognizing predictors of poor risk or the importance of evaluating clinical symptoms can result in missed opportunities to change treatment strategy, leading to suboptimal outcomes. These results will support design of educational programs and performance improvement interventions."
As this study shows, CME is critical to healthcare provider's ongoing educational needs as they strive to stay current with the advances of medical science. Cancer treatment options like RCC demand physicians stay on top of the latest breakthroughs. Continuing medical education companies utilize innovative methodologies to o...
Source: Policy and Medicine - February 28, 2014 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Thomas Sullivan Source Type: blogs
ACCME Adopts Changes to Simplify the Accreditation Requirements
The Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) announced that its Board of Directors has adopted changes to simplify the accreditation requirements and process. This includes changes to the accreditation criteria for ACCME accredited providers of continuing medical education.
The ACCME had proposed a broad spectrum of changes including changes to the use of logos in disclosing commercial support. At this time has delayed for further discussion changes concerning the use of corporate logos and changes to the criteria for accreditation with commendation.
The purpose of the changes is to streamline the...
Source: Policy and Medicine - February 27, 2014 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Thomas Sullivan Source Type: blogs
Continuing Medical Education Deserves More Scrutiny: Study
At a time when increasing scrutiny is applied to funding for continuing medical education, a new study notes that relatively little is known about medical communications companies – the for-profit businesses that exist to provide physicians with up-to-date clinical and scientific information. And the study authors suggest that there is good reason to take a closer at these so-called MCCs.
Why? For one thing, 14 drug and device makers provided MCCs with more funds than any other type of entity, including academic medical centers, professional associations and research organizations – MCCs received 26 percent of all fund...
Source: Pharmalot - December 19, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: esilverman Source Type: blogs
CME: ACCME Invites Feedback on Proposal to Simplify Accreditation Requirements; Potential to Prohibit Logos of Commercial Supporters
We described the principles of this policy in the 2011 call for comment." At that time the ACCME recieved input from stakeholders but they delayed action on this until a later time. Now the ACCME is bringing back this issue. From the description, it is not clear what motivates them to bring this issue up again at this time.
Alternative Solution
In response to these proposals and amended changes, the CME Coalition recently created "Responsible Logo Use Guidelines" for CME providers. In announcing the guidelines, the Coalition stated its belief that "the use of corporate logos provides transparency and disclosure ...
Source: Policy and Medicine - December 19, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Thomas Sullivan Source Type: blogs
Continuing Medical Education (CME): Flawed JAMA Report Blurs Line Between “Medical Communication Companies” and Accredited “Medical Education Companies”
Today, the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) published a brief report (Medical Communication Companies and Industry Grants) as well as an editorial in order to explore "the financial relationships between MCCs and drug device companies." The authors use a mixture of outdated figures, hyperbole, and blatant untruths to piece together their articles, which, according to CME Coalition Senior Advisor, Andrew Rosenberg, contain "so many inaccuracies and examples of unfounded innuendo" that "it is a challenge to enumerate them all."
JAMA has decided not to make the report available to the public, but we have c...
Source: Policy and Medicine - December 18, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Thomas Sullivan Source Type: blogs
Continuing Medical Education (CME): Association of Clinical Researchers and Educators Calls Out Flawed JAMA Study
The following is taken from a press release from the Association of Clinical Researchers and Educators
This week the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) published a "brief report" and editorial on medical communications companies and industry grants. This paper is reminiscent of the parental admonition of "do as I say, not as I do". In the article, the authors comment that in 2010 private medical communications companies received $100 million from industry. According to the AMA annual report, in 2010 JAMA, a subsidiary of AMA, received over $25 million in advertising revenue. Both JAMA and the medica...
Source: Policy and Medicine - December 18, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Thomas Sullivan Source Type: blogs
Are doctors being duped through medical education? Could social media help?
I made a discovery this week about the novel anticoagulant medications, dabigatran (Pradaxa), rivaroxaban (Xarelto), apixaban (Eliquis) and edoxaban (Lixiana). I was looking into the often-asked question of how these new drugs compare to the old standard, warfarin.
The discovery felt like a Eureka moment. I ran it by my stats guy–my son–and a couple of colleagues, and they confirmed, that my discovery was truth. I’m working on a post now that discusses the details of how the medical world has been misled about these drugs. Stay tuned.
Medical Education:
For now, though, this revelation got me thinking abo...
Source: Dr John M - December 14, 2013 Category: Cardiology Authors: Dr John Source Type: blogs
CME Coalition Questions Pew Taskforce on COI Recommendations as “Irresponsible” and Potentially Dangerous to America’s Health
This week, the Pew Charitable Trust Prescription Project released a small task force report for academic medical centers which included recommendations around continuing medical education (CME) that, if followed, could eliminate one out of every three dollars that are invested in accredited medical instruction for America's doctors today. On the basis of three studies, from 1988, 1992, and 2001, the Pew recommendations merely restate their longstanding condemnation of accredited CME: that any financial support from commercial interests—no matter how stringent the restrictions on its use—renders the curriculum irrevocab...
Source: Policy and Medicine - December 13, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Thomas Sullivan Source Type: blogs
Physician Payment Sunshine Act: Listing of Policy and Medicine Resources for Open Payments
This report is of particular interest to those stakeholders who are currently gearing up for implementation and compliance with the Physician Payments Sunshine Act a government surveillance and monitoring program targeting manufacturers' payments to physicians and teaching hospitals. One of the main requirements under the reporting provisions is that manufacturers and GPOs report a physician's name, address, NPI number, and other identifying information all based on information in the NPPS database.
Physician Payment Sunshine Act: CMS Teleconference Offers Future Clarification and Links to New Patient-Physician Broch...
Source: Policy and Medicine - December 10, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Thomas Sullivan Source Type: blogs
