Supreme Court To Rule On ‘Data Mining’ Of Prescription Drug Records

Discussion in 'Pfizer' started by Anonymous, Jan 8, 2011 at 12:06 PM.

Tags: Add Tags

  1. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    Transparency and full knowledge is a great thing. Not only should Big Pharma have Rx data, but the public at-large should have it as well alongside financial interest disclosure data w/ pharma and med company relationships for better disclosure and accountability.
     
  2. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    In my day we did not have this data and we were better reps for not having it. It required probing and listening skills as opposed to just having a big mouth that the reps now a day's possess. Or, how about the reps that go in and show the data to the doctors and challenge them with it. That is real professional behavior, I believe this why the industry in in the shape that it is in - no professionalism exist anymore. Yeah, I know I am an old fuddy duddy, but at least my doctors respect me. I will probably be gone on the next cut anyway.
     
  3. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    pp The biggest obstacle isn't lack of data or reps who challenge doctors it is managed care. Daily I encounter providers absolutely fatigued with the prior auth/step edit to get to tier two or three.

    yeah. yeah we may get a m/c win here or there but because of being constantly burdened with the additional charting, phone calls to pharmacies and filling out the forms, it's difficult.

    To the old "fuddy duddy" back in the day a physician could get a branded drug without the steps and paperwork. It was just convincing them it was a better choice and worth a higher co-pay to the pt.
     
  4. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    http://harp.org/humbach.htm

    To my knowledge, no HMO entity or personnel have ever yet been criminally prosecuted for wrongful delay or denial of treatment authorization. It may, however, be only a matter of time before such prosecutions are attempted. Already there is a growing interest in civil actions for the harms that ensue when people, relying on HMOs, suffer or die because benefits are denied.13 There is, moreover, considerable disquiet about the federal limitations on HMO liability that were enacted by Congress in the Employee’s Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA).14 However, the ERISA exemptions do not apply to criminal laws.15 In many cases, criminal prosecutions may therefore be the only effective avenues of redress.

    In any case, criminal sanctions may actually work better than mere civil damages to motivate HMOs to authorize the medical treatments that their subscribers are contractually entitled to. One of the biggest disadvantages of allowing civil damages against HMOs is that the companies can simply shift the burdens of those "penalties" back to the subscribers, in the form of higher premiums. For the HMO, the amounts paid out as damages in lawsuits become just another cost of doing business. As a result, civil damages for wrongful treatment denials may actually work against the interests of the HMO’s subscribers and patients, increasing premiums and diverting scarce resources away from medical care into judgments and lawyers’ fees.
     
  5. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    As a former Pfizer rep it always made me feel rather uncomfortable to have so much prescribing information on physicians. I think that what a physician prescribes is between themselves, their patient and the pharmacist.
    Before we had all of this data, we were much better sales people and much more professional.

    No wonder why physicians avoid and run from pharma reps. I'd run too. Pharma reps waste their clinic time, interrupt their staff and bug the crap out of them. Information on drugs is readily available "ON LINE" and samples can be Fed Exed.

    When will this craziness stop?
     
  6. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    IMS pharmacy "prescribing data" was actually only 3% of the scripts, the other 97% was extrapolated from that 3%. I know this for a fact. Therefore, the computer "prescribing data" is a very flawed estimate and has little relation to reality.
     
  7. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    If you know for a fact, why don't you turn yourself in you freaking criminal bastard!
     
  8. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    It varies by location, though. If you know what you claim to know then you should be aware of this.
     
  9. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    I still work for Pfizer and it has, and still does, make me uncomfortable that so much personal prescription data is shared with vendors who sell the data to the pharma companies. When are the consumer groups going to stand up and stop this flow of personal information? Just think what Pfizer could do with the money they save by not paying big bucks for physician prescribing data? The cost of prescriptions would never be lowered to reflect the savings but the shareholders would be happier. In addition, it may make us reps (at least the newer ones who don't know any better) better at our jobs.