Pfizer, Glaxo Disclose Fees to U.S. Doctors

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By PETER LOFTUS
Pfizer Inc. paid $177 million and GlaxoSmithKline PLC paid $85 million during 2010 to U.S. doctors and institutions for their work on clinical trials, consulting, speaking and other items, the companies disclosed Thursday.

They were the latest disclosures in a trend toward more transparency by drug makers, which have been criticized for using payments to doctors to unduly influence prescribing patterns, or to promote unauthorized uses of drugs. The companies defend the payments as necessary to help conduct research and to educate physicians about the authorized uses of their drugs.

Pfizer and some other drug makers, including Cephalon Inc. and Eli Lilly & Co., are required to post certain physician-payment data in connection with settlements of government investigations of allegedly improper marketing practices. Others, including Glaxo, Merck & Co. and Johnson & Johnson, have begun making disclosures voluntarily, to varying degrees.

Under last year's U.S. health-care overhaul legislation, all drug makers will be required to begin collecting uniform data on physician payments in 2012, and to report the data to the government beginning in 2013. The government plans to make the data available in a publicly searchable database.

Supporters of the legislation say the disclosures will help foster greater accountability, and will inform patients about any financial relationships between their doctors and drug manufacturers.

Pfizer's disclosure Thursday is one of the more comprehensive to date for any drug maker, due to requirements stemming from its $2.3 billion settlement in 2009 of a government probe of allegations that it improperly marketed former pain drug Bextra and other products for unauthorized uses.

The report on its website lists payments to individual doctors and includes meals, business travel expenses and educational items of at least $10 in value [and for any professional receiving more than $100 a year, all transactions regardless of value].

The New York-based company said about $108 million of its total payments in 2010 reflects work conducted with nearly 1,000 research organizations and academic medical centers to study how medicines work, and to develop new medicines. This includes costs for patient recruitment and other items. Pfizer's total research-and-development costs for 2010 were $9.4 billion.

Other elements of Pfizer's 2010 payments included:

—$34.4 million in speaking fees to about 4,600 professionals to discuss Pfizer products and health topics at events with other professionals.

—$18 million worth of meals, much of which were provided to doctors in their offices by Pfizer sales representatives.

—$8.9 million in professional advising fees to 1,400 doctors.

—$5.8 million in travel expenses.

—$1.7 million in education items.

U.K.-based Glaxo paid $28.5 million to various institutions for their help in conducting research, the company said. The payments were associated with 127 studies involving 595 different lead researchers or principal investigators. Glaxo's total 2010 R&D costs were $6.9 billion.

In addition, Glaxo paid $56.8 million in speaking or advisory fees to 5,331 health-care professionals.

Earlier this week, Merck said it paid $20.4 million in speaking fees to doctors in 2010. However, this figure didn't include consulting fees or payments for clinical research, and it excluded payments associated with programs Merck inherited in its 2009 takeover of Schering-Plough.

Pfizer said its figures included programs associated with Wyeth, which it acquired in 2009.

Write to Peter Loftus at peter.loftus@dowjones.com
 




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