Bad News for Big Pharma
One hospital group in Minnesota has done what we have been urging for years—thrown out promotional items from pharmaceutical companies.
When a Duluth-based operator of hospitals and clinics purged the pens, notepads, coffee mugs and other promotional trinkets drug companies had given its doctors over the years, it took 20 shopping carts to haul the loot away.
The operator, SMDC Health System, intends to ship the 18,718 items to the west African nation of Cameroon.
The purge underscored SMDC's decision to join the growing movement to ban gifts to doctors from drug companies.
SMDC scoured its four hospitals and 17 clinics across northeastern Minnesota and northwestern Wisconsin for clipboards, clocks, mouse pads, stuffed animals and other items decorated with logos for such drugs as Nexium, Vytorin and Lipitor....
The backlash against the cozy relationships between doctors and drug makers gained steam from article in the Journal of the American Medical Association in 2006. It said research had shown that even cheap gifts, such as pens, can affect doctors' prescribing decisions.
It woiuld have been nice for the article to mention No Free Lunch, whose inclusion in the Bear Left Link Library dates from 2001, but one cannot have everything.
Labels: Big Pharma, Drug reps, excellent corporate tricks
