Sens. Move to Block Drug Makers from Mining Rx Data
From Associated Press (December 10, 2009)
WASHINGTON--Drug companies would no longer be able to mine pharmacy
records to track which doctors are prescribing their medications,
under a proposal unveiled Thursday by two Senate Democrats.
The amendment to the Senate health care bill would effectively ban
pharmaceutical data mining, the drug company practice of buying
prescription records to target sales pitches to doctors.
Sens. Herb Kohl of Wisconsin and Dick Durbin of Illinois say the
measure will combat "harassing sales practices" and "restrain undue
influence" of pharmaceutical salespersons.
Companies like IMS Health Inc. and Verispan LLC have built
multimillion-dollar businesses around gathering prescription data
and selling the information to pharmaceutical companies.
Pfizer Inc., Merck
& Co. Inc. and others use the data to identify
doctors who are prescribing their drugs, as well as treatments from
other companies. When salespeople visit a doctor's office they
tailor their presentation to the doctor's individual prescribing
habits.
Still, the amendment from Kohl and Durbin faces an uphill climb to
become law. The Senate has been debating the health care bill since
the beginning of last week and is expected to resume Monday. The
House of Representatives already passed its version of the bill,
which opted to study the issue of data mining, not limit it.
A spokesman for Norwalk, Conn.-based IMS said that interfering with
data mining "has the potential to harm patients," since the
information is used by federal agencies to track patient
safety.
However, the Senate amendment only bars the sale of prescribing
records "for marketing purposes."
Consumer advocates say the Senate effort could raise the profile of
data mining in Congress and among state lawmakers.
New Hampshire and Vermont already passed state restrictions on data
mining, despite vigorous legal challenges by IMS Health, Verispan
and others. A similar law in Maine was struck down by a district
court, but has been appealed by the state's attorney general.
"I think both at both federal and state levels you'll see continued
momentum because it's clear the issue of drug marketing influence
hasn't been addressed yet," said Marcia Hams, director of
prescription access at Community Catalyst, a nonprofit health care
advocate.
Opponents of data mining say tightening state budgets have
highlighted the role pharmaceutical marketers play in driving up
health care costs.
"The more pressure there is on Medicaid budgets and private
insurance premiums, the more state legislators are realizing that
industry marketing promotes expensive drugs over less expensive
ones," Hams said.
Data mining executives say that without their products drug
companies would have to hire even larger sales forces, because they
wouldn't be able to target their efforts.
Posted: December 2009
