A recent poll by consulting firm QPharma indicates that while HCPs know Sunshine transparency rules exist, they may not be clear on what this can mean on a personal level.
The rules requires industry translate physician contact — courses, meal, and speaker fees, for example — into a dollar sum. The data collected from August through December will be live and searchable as of 2014.
QPharma found that 45% of the 300 respondents said they did not know that speaker fees will be reported, even if doctors ask that the money be given to a charitable organization. Forty-one percent copped to knowing that gifts under $10 did not have to be reported, but that they did not know that gifts will be reported if the aggregate value goes over $100.
Qpharma also found that 62% of doctors said they did not samples would be recorded, and 56% also said they did not know that the FDA now has a record of any samples they’ve signed for.
Specialists were less aware of the requirement, compared to primary care physicians, with 59% of polled specialists saying they did not know about the requirement, compared to 54% of polled primary care physicians.
This split also carried over into knowing samples were being tracked: 56% of specialists said it was news to them, compared with 43% of primary care physicians.
An earlier survey in which MMIS polled 1,000 physicians, released days after issuance of the final Sunshine rule, showed that over half didn’t know that the Sunshine Act requires companies to report on expenditures annually, and that such information would be made public. MMIS researchers characterized doctors’ unfamiliarity with the rules as “increasingly problematic.”
From the December 01, 2013 Issue of MM+M - Medical Marketing and Media
