Industry Payments To Physicians Topped $12 Billion Over Nearly A Decade

More than $12 billion in payments were made from industry to physicians from 2013 to 2022, an analysis of payment data showed.

Over this time period, 85,087,744 payments with a total value of $12.13 billion were made by industry to 826,313 physicians, with 93.8% of these payments associated with one or more marketed medical products, reported Andrew Foy, MD, of the Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center in Hershey, Pennsylvania, and colleagues in a JAMAopens in a new tab or window research letter.

"There is somewhat of a consensus, but it's certainly not shared by everyone in medicine or even in academic medicine, that physician-industry relationships ... may represent a conflict of interest," Foy told MedPage Today. "And that could have sort of deleterious consequences on physician prescribing in general, practices that are recommended by professional guidelines, and so on and so forth."

The top three drugs related to industry payments in the U.S. during the study period were rivaroxaban (Xarelto), apixaban (Eliquis), and adalimumab (Humira), with $176.34 million, $102.62 million, and $100.17 million in associated payments, respectively. The top medical devices related to industry payments were the da Vinci Surgical System, Mako SmartRobotics, and CoreValve Evolut, with $307.52 million, $50.13 million, and $44.79 million in associated payments, respectively.