Don't be a pig.

[McDoctor]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/10/health/10psyche.html?_r=1&hp=&oref=slogin&pagewanted=all

exceprts:

A New York Times analysis of records in Minnesota, the only state that requires public reports of all drug company marketing payments to doctors, provides rare documentation of how financial relationships between doctors and drug makers correspond to the growing use of atypicals in children.

From 2000 to 2005, drug maker payments to Minnesota psychiatrists rose more than sixfold, to $1.6 million. During those same years, prescriptions of antipsychotics for children in Minnesota's Medicaid program rose more than ninefold.

Those who took the most money from makers of atypicals tended to prescribe the drugs to children the most often, the data suggest. On average, Minnesota psychiatrists who received at least $5,000 from atypical makers from 2000 to 2005 appear to have written three times as many atypical prescriptions for children as psychiatrists who received less or no money.

"Atypicals" refers to atypical antipsychotics, for those who haven't read the whole article.

When the voting public eventually demands socialized medicine, we doctors will have ourselves to blame. Too many of us act like pigs, sacrificing public health and patient welfare to fill our hedonistic desire to have our ego's jacked off by the drug company flattery in the form of "consulting" jobs.

This article makes it sound like money is the motivation, but those of us in the trenches know it is really flattery and intellectual insecurity that is the driving force behind big pharm influence. The way these companies set up doctors in fancy hotels and ask them to give educational talks ("after all, you are considered by many of your peers to be a thought leader in [insert specialty here]") and massage their ego is analgous to the way Vegas casino treats their high rollers. We all know who comes out on top in that relationship.

We all know some clown like these Minnesota psychiatrists in this story. The guy with the "consulting job" and prescribes Zyprexa for every patient who ever had a bad day in their life. You need to stop being so polite to him/her, and ostracize this person with the same fervor you ostracize the doctor who does part time work as an expert witness for malpractice plaintiffs.

I implore all current and future doctors on these boards to take some personal responsibility. I'm not saying you can't take a pen or eat a slice of pizza while you nod politley at the handsome guy/girl in a suit pushing the latest research on bisposhponates under your nose. I'm just saying, stop being a pig. You know who you are.

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[sdn1977]

I read that article & thought the same actually.

The comment from the psychiatrist who did the study in which she documented better outcomes from using atypicals, but when interviewed stated there was not a significant diffence was somewhat eye-opening.

I honestly didn't pursue the literature enough to see if there were any letters to the editor of the journal in which the study was published to see if peers had any comment at all - or really what journal it was published in.

I take things written in newspapers with a grain of salt and these payments are not that much in reality. But, you know what "they" say - one negative comment outweighs 10 positive ones.....

Its all in appearances to the patients - it just doesn't "look" right.