Industry support of physician education in the USA

Introduction

Pharmaceutical and medical device manufacturers spend billions annually marketing to physicians in the form of food and beverages, gifts and educational materials, as well as for speaker and consulting fees, and funding for continuing medical education (CME) programmes. Industry payments to physicians may influence physician prescribing,1 and potentially even disease definitions,2 and can therefore influence health expenditures and the healthcare system at large.3 Details of these payments have recently come to light with the passage of the Sunshine Act within the 2010 Affordable Care Act in the USA, and the resulting Open Payments programme. The effects, ethics and need for disclosure of such ties have long been debated.45 In this article, we review the role that industry plays in the education of physicians, including analyses of initial data from the Open Payments programme, and we discuss...

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