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Study shows most doctors endorsing drugs on X are paid to do so

medicalxpress.com

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Re: Study shows most doctors endorsing drugs on X are paid to do so

#41

Post by arp242 »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #17

There was a recent HN post about a weight-loss drug where I bit my tongue and did not try to "rebut" stuff there with a comment about diet and lifestyle . Methinks this problem runs deeper than paying doctors to promote drugs. Americans fundamentally seem to see drugs and surgeries as "health care" in a way I find concerning.

This is hardly an American thing; you see the same in Europe, and presumably other places. This is why antibiotics resistance is a problem in many parts of the world.

I once overheard a coworker give a doctor a right bollocking over the phone because he wouldn't prescribe antibiotics for her daughter who had the flu, and she then proceeded to tell rant how ridiculous that doctor was. I've rarely had to spend more effort to stop myself from saying some rather unpleasant (albeit true) things.

Re: Study shows most doctors endorsing drugs on X are paid to do so

#42

Post by davidgay »

consumer451 wrote: post #4

From related stories on TFA page: > Doctors received approximately $12.1 billion from drug and device makers between 2013–2022, study reveals https://medicalxpress.com/news/2024-03-doctors-approximately...

This is the bad kind of statistic, because it doesn't actually tell us anything interesting about the impact on individual doctors (but does sound scary / impressive!).

A Google search says the US has 1 million doctors, so $12B over 10 years is $12k/doctor/year on average - nice, but not wow...

The linked article did actually have something useful to say on a per-doctor basis:"The analysis showed that more than half of physicians received at least one payment, and roughly 94% of payments were associated with one or more marketed medical products. A small percentage of physicians received the largest amounts, often exceeding $1 million".

So: nice but small for most doctors, rather (too?) large for a small percentage.

Re: Study shows most doctors endorsing drugs on X are paid to do so

#43

Post by spondylosaurus »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #24
spondylosaurus wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...are drugs and surgeries not healthcare?

Eating right is health care. Exercise is health care. Decent housing is health care. Drugs and surgeries are medical care and I grew up with the weird idea that it's crisis management, not your first line of defense while acting like diet and lifestyle are annoying details you can stop worrying about if you can get the right prescription.

I may just be coming at this from a different angle (as someone with chronic genetic conditions), but differentiating between "health care" and "medical care" seems like unnecessarily splitting hairs to me. The place I go every few months to get the drugs that make me a functional human being has "health" in the name :P

Like, I understand where you're coming from on the diet angle specifically, but some of this strikes me as painting with strokes that are just a bit too broad for the other thousands of reasons people need drugs or surgery.

Re: Study shows most doctors endorsing drugs on X are paid to do so

#44

Post by s1artibartfast »

ClassyJacket wrote: post #40
chuckadams wrote: post #8

Doctors who fail to disclose an interest should lose their license. The SEC doesn't tolerate such shenanigans for finance, why should the FDA permit it for drugs?

Doctors who are paid to endorse a drug should lose their licence

Why is that? Surely you mean without proper disclosure.

Re: Study shows most doctors endorsing drugs on X are paid to do so

#45

Post by lantry »

takinola wrote: post #36

While non-disclosure by doctors prescribing drugs they profit from is unethical, I would be interested to know if doctors change which drugs they prescribe if when paid by different pharma companies ie are doctors recommending the drugs because they are being paid or are they just being paid because they recommend the drugs.

Yes, physician behavior is influenced by pharmaceutical sales/marketing.

https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/fact-shee...

Re: Study shows most doctors endorsing drugs on X are paid to do so

#46

Post by DoreenMichele »

spondylosaurus wrote: post #43
DoreenMichele wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eating right is health care. Exercise is health care. Decent housing is health care. Drugs and surgeries are medical care and I grew up with the weird idea that it's crisis management, not your first line of defense while acting like diet and lifestyle are annoying details you can stop worrying about if you can get the right prescription.

I may just be coming at this from a different angle (as someone with chronic genetic conditions), but differentiating between "health care" and "medical care" seems like unnecessarily splitting hairs to me. The place I go every few months to get the drugs that make me a functional human being has "health" in the name :P Like, I understand where you're coming from on the diet angle specifically, but some of this strik…

I also have an incurable genetic condition.

It's part of why I have spent so much time thinking about this and feel so strongly about it.

Re: Study shows most doctors endorsing drugs on X are paid to do so

#47

Post by s1artibartfast »

llamaimperative wrote: post #26
SayMyName wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As of their latest reporting I could find on the fda site, 3.3B out of their 7.2B budget comes from "user fees", so the more drugs are sold, the more they get back in user fees.

Pretty sure user fees are tied to new drug applications, not to sales. As in FDA validating your trial results is obscenely expensive and they make the companies who consume those services pay for them.

This is correct. It isn't validation or technical series. It is purely review.

Re: Study shows most doctors endorsing drugs on X are paid to do so

#48

Post by roywiggins »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #24
spondylosaurus wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...are drugs and surgeries not healthcare?

Eating right is health care. Exercise is health care. Decent housing is health care. Drugs and surgeries are medical care and I grew up with the weird idea that it's crisis management, not your first line of defense while acting like diet and lifestyle are annoying details you can stop worrying about if you can get the right prescription.

Okay, but imagine you work in public health. We have decades of attempts at convincing and helping people to make lifestyle changes. There are a thousand diet plans, a thousand attempts at consumer education, and it's gotten us this far, which isn't very.

What non-pharmaceutical intervention would you propose- something that could be rolled out as a program- that hasn't been done before, and would work, in say the next decade?

Because at a population level, these drugs seem to be doing more than the cumulative efforts of a million dietitians.

Re: Study shows most doctors endorsing drugs on X are paid to do so

#49

Post by vsuperpower2020 »

whimsicalism wrote: post #21
WarOnPrivacy wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not for a very long time. The current prescription opioid crisis is for the millions of patients in pain unable to get any pain meds (ex: ibupofen following surgery).

lots of people i see posting about the difficulty of availability stuff seem to be drug seeking for chronic reasons

It depends on the doctor. Seeing as some doctors give them too freely and others would rather let patients suffer, I propose we just save time and use a roulette table. It's transparent, easy, and you know exactly why you're been awarded or deprived of pain medication.

Re: Study shows most doctors endorsing drugs on X are paid to do so

#50

Post by recursive »

takinola wrote: post #36

While non-disclosure by doctors prescribing drugs they profit from is unethical, I would be interested to know if doctors change which drugs they prescribe if when paid by different pharma companies ie are doctors recommending the drugs because they are being paid or are they just being paid because they recommend the drugs.

I don't think those things are really different. Consider, for the sake of argument, that the doctors are endorsing drugs from the goodness of their hearts for the betterment of humanity. What incentive do the pharmas have to pay them? They're not known for altruism. If the payment had no impact whatsoever, they'd save their money. If docs know they might get paid, that's really not ethically different from having a payment agreement in advance.
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