The Sun Continues to Shine

You will remember perhaps that I wrote a Blog about legislation passed in the USA some months ago such that industry will have to declare what it pays to doctors for lectures, travel, etc. and how much.  This has now come into effect and there was an interesting article in the American Journal of Transplantation from the Johns Hopkins in June of this year in which the authors had a close look at what payments had been made to transplant surgeons in the USA over 5 months from August to December in 2013..  Transplant surgeons (n=297) received a total of $759,654. The median interquartile payment was $125 with a range from $39 to $1018.  Seventeen surgeons received more than $10,000 and the highest payment to an individual surgeon was $83,520.  Interestingly, but perhaps not surprisingly, consultants with the highest H index were associated with 30% higher chance of receiving more than $1000. I would hope that the authors will continue to follow this up as it will clarify some of the interactions between industry and transplant clinicians and they should include an analysis of transplant physicians as well as transplant surgeons.