Drug firms paid New Jersey doctors $12.4 million in 2010

A Livingston respiratory specialist was paid nearly $40,000 by the drug company Merck last year to speak to other medical professionals around the country about conditions treated by one of its top selling medicines. Dr. Gagliardi, who is considered an expert in pulmonary care, spoke at least 13 times in 2010 at meeting in Connecticut, New York and California. In Atlantic City, he once gave a talk about motivating patients to manage their asthma, but Merck’s asthma medicine was never mentioned during the talk. The doctor was quoted as saying, “I would never speak for the company if I thought my role was promoting a drug. That is why companies have drug representatives.” We all know that there is nothing illegal about the extra paycheck doctors receive from Merck, the pharmaceutical industry’s practice of paying physicians for meals, speaking engagements and consulting has been criticized for years as a possible ethical problem for doctors.

In 2010, 11 drugmakers, including New-Jersey based Merck and Johnson & Johnson, paid out more than $446 million to doctors across the country, according to the news agency ProPublica. Collectively, thousands of physicians in New Jersey received $12.4 million from the companies.

All the questions that have been raised over the years still remain. Physicians who want to talk to companies about drug companies’ product should do that. The problem is when those talks are associated with a gift or pay of some kind. In the past the practice of big pharma paying speaking fees to physicians was largely secret but as a result of court agreements to settle allegations of fraudulent marketing activities many of the largest drug makers started detailing their relationship with medical professionals.

With prescription drug abuse on the rise, and with New Jersey drug rehab programs filling up with victims and users of pill mills, the doctor/pharma relationship probably deserves more scrutiny.

Drug rehabs have reported that many street drug abusers actually started with prescription drugs. The more careful doctors are in prescribing potentially addictive medications, the better.