Doctors in the US who are paid and entertained by drug companies are more than twice as likely to prescribe their products, according to a groundbreaking new study on the influence of industry marketing on medical practices.
Among a sample of 334,000 physicians, researchers found a typical doctor had a 13 per cent chance of prescribing the drugs of a dozen leading pharmaceutical companies. Among the 193,000 who received meals or speaking, consulting or other fees from the companies, the probability jumped to nearly 30 per cent.
The findings, based on recently released data that 12 companies have been forced to make public as a result of US regulatory settlements, will rekindle the debate over the limits of aggressive pharmaceutical marketing, which risks incurring unnecessarily costly medical treatment and causing harm to patients.