Study: Device Manufacturer-Physician Payment Disclosure Lacked About 20% of Time

The rate of disclosure by orthopedic device manufacturers of payments made to physicians for presentations was about 71 percent,according to a study in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The study analyzed reports of payments made to physicians by five manufacturers—DePuy, Smith & Nephew, Zimmer Holdings Inc., Biomet Inc. and Stryker Corp.—of total hip and knee prostheses in 2007. For each payment recipient who authored a presentation or served as a committee member or board member at the 2008 annual meeting of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, the disclosure statement was reviewed to determine whether the payment had been disclosed, according to the study.

To get a better understanding of the reasons for nondisclosure, a survey was distributed to physicians who had received payments that were undisclosed.

The findings, according to the report, were:

• The overall rate of disclosure was 71.2 percent (245 of 344 payments). For payments that were directly related to the topic of the presentation at the meeting, the rate was 79.3 percent (165 of 208); for payments that were indirectly related, the rate was 50 percent (16 of 32); and for payments that were unrelated, the rate was 49.2 percent (29 of 59).

• Payments were more likely to have been disclosed if they exceeded $10,000 and were directed toward an individual physician rather than a company or organization.

• Among the 36 physicians who responded to the survey regarding reasons for nondisclosure (response rate, 39.6 percent), the reasons most commonly given for nondisclosure were: the payment was unrelated to the topic of presentation at the annual meeting (38.9 percent of respondents) and that the physician had misunderstood the disclosure requirements (13.9 percent); 11.1 percent reported that the payment had been disclosed but was mistakenly omitted from the program.

To see the complete study, visit
http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/361/15/1466.