See Also:
Health & Medicine
- Surgeons as Consultants
- Report: Ashcroft firm in big money deal - By By Tom Hester Jr. Associated Press Writer, Boston Globe, November 20, 2007. "Former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft's law firm could earn $52.2 million helping the U.S. attorney's office in New Jersey monitor a leading maker of knee and hip replacements, according to recent public filings."
- Your Doctor's Business Is Your Business - By David Armstrong, Wall Street Journal, November 20, 2007. "Some doctor groups are now insisting their members take the initiative in telling patients about financial connections. A new set of professional standards from the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons mandates, beginning in January, that surgeons in the group begin disclosing to patients any financial arrangements with industry that relate to a patient's treatment."
- Surgeons paid millions as consultants - By Lindy Washburn, North Jersey Media Group, November 19, 2007. "All in all, more than 1,800 medical consultants -- including 37 in New Jersey -- received payments from the five largest joint makers, who control 95 percent of the nearly $10-billion-a-year business. Forty-six received more than $1 million each. As part of a settlement with U.S. Attorney Christopher J. Christie, the five manufacturers agreed in September to post the names of their surgeon consultants and the amounts paid to them."
- Hub surgeons got millions from implant firms - By Elizabeth Cooney, Boston Globe, November 7, 2007. "The disclosures come as payments to doctors by device and drug companies come under increasing scrutiny because of concerns they create a financial conflict for physicians. But the industry, and many doctors and hospitals, defend the practice, saying it fosters innovation and properly rewards physicians for helping to develop new treatments."
- Are doctors getting fees or 'bribes'? Artificial knee and hip makers settle accusations with Justice Dept. - By Bill Toland, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, November 07, 2007. "Neither the Justice Department nor U.S. attorney's office prosecutors have suggested that all, or even most, of the payments were of the kickback variety. Nonetheless, some of the payments look extravagant on their face, one of the factors that drew the attention of federal investigators in the first place."
- Orthopedic-Device Firms Show Millions Paid to Consultants - By Jon Kamp, Wall Street Journal, November 1, 2007. "The five major makers of orthopedic devices have disclosed on their Web sites the millions of dollars in payments they made to U.S. consultants so far this year, including 47 cases where payments topped more than $1 million."
- Artificial Joint Makers Lobby Hard - By Joshua Freed, Associated Press, Forbes, 11/2/2007. "The settlement required the companies to disclose who it paid during 2007, and to update the information quarterly. Later this year, it will also require them to disclose non-monetary payments, such as trips."
- Zimmer, J&J, Hip- and Knee-Device Makers Reveal Fees - By David Voreacos, Bloomberg, November 1, 2007. "It's one part in a series of changes that are going on in the industry right now,'' said Jason Wittes, an analyst at Leerink Swann & Co. ``This puts pressure on the doctors who have entered into these agreements because a lot of payments that were done behind closed doors are now completely out in the open.''
- Artificial-Joint Makers Settle Kickback Case - By Barnaby J. Feder, New York Times, September 28, 2007. "Four of the nation's biggest makers of artificial hips and knees have agreed to pay a total of $310 million in penalties to settle federal accusations that they used fake consulting agreements and other tactics to get surgeons to use their products."
Biomet, DePuy Orthopaedics Inc., Smith & Nephew and Zimmer have deferred prosecution agreements (dpa) with the U.S. Attorney's Office in New Jersey and have listed recipients of payments as required by the settlement to post them prominently on the company's websites. Stryker was not prosecuted because it cooperated with federal investigators, but it was required to post names and amounts on its website. (Stryker posted information in a format that makes it difficult to view or reproduce).
See DOJ press release - Five Companies in Hip and Knee Replacement Industry Avoid Prosecution by Agreeing to Compliance Rules and Monitoring. Below are links to the lists (not always "prominently" posted):
- Biomet: Company Consultants: Identification and Payments - Among the highest paid MDs were John Cuckler (Alabama Medical Consultants), Homewood AL; Thomas K. Donaldson, Colton CA; Adolph V. Lombardi, New Albany OH; and Bradley K. Vaughn, Raleigh NC.
- DePuy - Among the highest paid MDs were John J. Callaghan, Iowa City IA; Douglas A. Dennis, Littleton CO; David F. Dalury (DFD LLC), Baltimore, MD; Charles A. Engh (Engh Consulting), Fredericksburg VA; Richard E. Jones, Dallas TX; Chitranjan S. Ranawat, New York NY; Thomas P. Schmalzried, Los Angeles CA; Richard D. Scott, Boston MA; and Thomas S. Thornhill, Boston MA.
- Smith & Nephew: Consultants and payments - Among the highest paid MDs were Robert Barrack (OrthoPartners), Clayton, MO; Ramon Gustilo, Minneapolis, MN; Steven Haas, New York NY; Richard Laskin, New York NY; Michael Ries, Tiburon, CA; and Leo Whiteside, St Louis, MO.
- Stryker Orthopaedics: Company Consultants - Identification & Payments - Surgeon Consultants - Peter Bonutti, Effingham IL; Lester S. Borden, Cleveland OH; William Capello, Indianapolis IN; Anthony K. Hedley, Phoenix AZ; Kenneth A. Krackow, Buffalo NY; Chitranjan Ranawat, Alpine NJ; and Richard Harrison Rothman, Philadelphia PA.
- Zimmer Company Consultants - Among the highest paid MDs were Thomas Andriacchi, Los Altos Hills CA; Richard A. Berger, Chicago, IL; Kim C. Bertin, North Salt Lake UT; Robert E. Booth, Jr., Philadelphia PA: Stephen Spiegelberg (Cambridge Polymer Group, Inc.), Boston MA; Lawrence D. Dorr, Inglewood CA; Harold K. Dunn, Salt Lake City UT; Jorge Galante, Clinton WI; Victor Goldberg, Gates Mills OH; Aaron A. Hofmann, Salt Lake City UT; John N. Insall (Estate of) New York NY; Michael A. Kelly, Franklin Lakes NJ; Wayne G. Paprosky, Glen Ellyn IL; Aaron Rosenberg, Deerfield IL; Harry Rubash, Weston MA; W. Norman Scott, New York NY; Kelly Vince, Hermosa Beach CA; Peter S. Walker, New York NY; Richard E. White, Jr., Albuquerque NM.
- American Academy of Allergy Asthma & Immunology - Their Find an Allergist locates physicians by name, zip code, state and country.
- American College of Gastroenterology - Has a GI Physician Locator.
- American Board of Medical Specialties - Their Who's Certified? allows you to verify the board certification status of any physician. You must register in order to use this service, but it is free. Has links to Member Boards and Associate Members.
- American Hospital Directory - Provides data for over 6,000 hospitals.The Free Search, available to non-subscribers, will locate Name and address, telephone, Medicare provider number, total staffed beds, hospital type, services provided and link to web site. (detailed information is available to subscribers only).
- Association of American Medical Colleges - With directory of Member Medical Schools.
- Association of Orthopedic Surgeons
- Bibliothèques médicales francophones - Links to medical schools in French-speaking countries assembled by the Bibliothèque médicale, CHU de Rouen.
- Columbia University Health Sciences Library Archives College of Physicians and Surgeons Obituary Database - "Contains over 6,300 death notices of physicians who were graduates and/or faculty members of the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons (P&S) and which were published in various Columbia University alumni publications up through Fall 2006."
- DIRLINE: Directory of Health Organizations - "National Library of Medicine's online database containing location and descriptive information about a wide variety of information resources including organizations, research resources, projects, and databases concerned with health and biomedicine." (See the DIRLINE Fact Sheet for more information about the database.)
- DocFinder - Association of State Medical Board Executive Directors provides links to participating state licensing authorities.
- Doctor Finder - American Medical Association database is searchable by name or by specialty. It "provides information on virtually every licensed physician in the United States and its possessions, including more than 690,000 doctors of medicine (MD) and doctors of osteopathy or osteopathic medicine (DO). All physician credential data have been verified for accuracy and authenticated by accrediting agencies, medical schools, residency training programs, licensing and certifying boards, and other data sources.
- DrScore
- Federation of American Hospitals - Has a Listing of Member Facilities.
- FREIDA - Database of approximately 7,800 graduate medical education programs accredited by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, as well as over 200 combined specialty programs. (FREIDA is an acronym for Fellowship and Residency Electronic Interactive Database.) Provided by the American Medical Association.
- Harvard Medicine: White Pages
- HealthGrades - Performance ratings of hospitals, physicians, nursing homes, home health agencies, hospice programs and fertility clinics based on Medicare data.
- Hospital Compare - United States Department of Health & Human Services. "Information on how well the hospitals in your area care for all their adult patients with certain medical conditions. This information will help you compare the quality of care hospitals provide. Hospital Compare was created through the efforts of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and organizations that represent hospitals, doctors, employers, accrediting organizations, other Federal agencies and the public."
- Hospitals on the Net - Health on the Net Foundation.
- Hospitals Records Database - Provides information on the existence and location of the records of the hospitals in the U.K., searchable by hospital or town name.
- HospitalWeb - List of hospitals sites on the Web; John Lester, Department of Neurology at Massachusetts General Hospital.
- List of Defaulted Borrowers - Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) site names doctors who have defaulted on their student loans (Health Education Assistance Loans - HEAL). Lists by amount due, discipline, name, school or state.
- Medical/Health Sciences Libraries on the Web - Eric Rumsey, Hardin Library for the Health Sciences, University of Iowa.
- Medicine on Earth: Women and Men Dedicated to Medicine - Searchable by last name, fields of interest, profession country and city. Curriculum Vitae are provided for each individual, sometimes supplemented by photographs and links to Medline article abstracts.
- National Health Information Center Health Information Resource Database - Keyword subject listing resources for 1,800 organizations and government offices that provide health information upon request. Also searchable by title, keyword, city or state.
- Questionable Doctors - "Comprehensive, publicly available databank that contains information on doctors who have been disciplined by state medical boards and federal agencies in the past ten years. It contains data on disciplinary actions taken for medical incompetence, misprescribing drugs, sexual misconduct, criminal convictions, ethical lapses and other offenses." Searchable by name or state. Currently (July 2002) there are 13 states in the database. Created by Public Citizen, a consumer advocacy group.
- U.S. News: Best Hospitals 2006 - Top-ranked hospitals with an Honor Roll.
- World Medical Association - With list of members by country.