Hospitals keep silent on drug firm hospitality and payments to doctors

HOSPITALS are failing to inform patients when doctors responsible for choosing their drugs have received thousands of pounds from pharmaceutical companies, a study reveals.

A survey in the British Medical Journal shows that just six per cent of NHS trusts publish their register of gifts and hospitality online, and that the majority make it practically impossible for patients to determine if there is a conflict of interest (COI).

Since 2010, direct gifts and inducements have been banned by the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI), following a Daily Telegraph investigation.

But clinicians may receive payments for a variety of reasons, such as delivering lectures or attending conferences and training events, which often come

‘The ongoing absence of transparency around COI in the UK may undermine public trust in the healthcare professions’

with lavish hospitality. In 2017, the pharmaceutical industry reported spending £116million on such activity.

Despite rules by the General Medical Council requiring healthcare providers to disclose any potential COI, the new research by Oxford University found that around two thirds of the trusts failed to record the names of doctors who had received hospitality.

The researchers are now calling for legislation similar to the Sunshine Act in the US, which requires all payments to doctors to be declared on to a single searchable database.

“The ongoing absence of transparency around COI in the UK may undermine public trust in the healthcare professions,” they said. “Simple, clear legislation and a requirement for open disclosure of COI to a central body, similar to that in the US, would present a simple and effective solution.”