Princess Health and Tales of Sales Reps. Princessiccia

Princess Health and Tales of Sales Reps. Princessiccia

Eli Lilly Pfizer pharmaceutical sales representatives whistle-blowers

Gusty 14:19 Add Comment

Two recent news stories about how pharmaceutical companies' sales representatives market to physicians provided some interesting information....
The Philadelphia Inquirer noted that Wyeth has joined GlaxoSmithKline, AstraZeneca, and Pfizer in laying off sales representatives. A pharmaceutical sales consultant remarked, "this may be related to the issue of public trust. What we'ver realized is that we've probably gone too far." On measure of the distance traveled is the figure the Inquirer cited for the number of sales representatives working in the US prior to the lay-offs, over 100, 000, or approximately one for every seven physicians (see this post for numbers of physicians in the US versus numbers of managers). More striking was the statement that "a succesful sales representative can earn $150,000 to $200,000 a year, including a car and other perks. That's more than many primary care physicians make (see this post on physicians' compensation.)
Meanwhile, a reporter for the Los Angeles Times interviewed Jamie Reidy, the author of Hard Sell, described as a "slacker's tale," about Reidy's life as a sales representative for Pfizer. Reidy said, "I was the kid who didn't become a doctor because I almost failed high school chemistry. I was trained for six weeks and considered qualified to tell doctors which drugs to prescribe. Scary, isn't it?"
At the end, this becomes another story about the perils of blowing the whistle about the management of large health care organizations. Reidy had left Pfizer, and was working in the oncology division of Eli Lilly, advancing to a trainer of other sales representatives, until his book came out. Then Lilly fired him.

Princess Health and Tales of Sales Reps.Princessiccia

Princess Health and Tales of Sales Reps.Princessiccia

Eli Lilly Pfizer pharmaceutical sales representatives whistle-blowers

Gusty 14:19 Add Comment

Two recent news stories about how pharmaceutical companies' sales representatives market to physicians provided some interesting information....
The Philadelphia Inquirer noted that Wyeth has joined GlaxoSmithKline, AstraZeneca, and Pfizer in laying off sales representatives. A pharmaceutical sales consultant remarked, "this may be related to the issue of public trust. What we'ver realized is that we've probably gone too far." On measure of the distance traveled is the figure the Inquirer cited for the number of sales representatives working in the US prior to the lay-offs, over 100, 000, or approximately one for every seven physicians (see this post for numbers of physicians in the US versus numbers of managers). More striking was the statement that "a succesful sales representative can earn $150,000 to $200,000 a year, including a car and other perks. That's more than many primary care physicians make (see this post on physicians' compensation.)
Meanwhile, a reporter for the Los Angeles Times interviewed Jamie Reidy, the author of Hard Sell, described as a "slacker's tale," about Reidy's life as a sales representative for Pfizer. Reidy said, "I was the kid who didn't become a doctor because I almost failed high school chemistry. I was trained for six weeks and considered qualified to tell doctors which drugs to prescribe. Scary, isn't it?"
At the end, this becomes another story about the perils of blowing the whistle about the management of large health care organizations. Reidy had left Pfizer, and was working in the oncology division of Eli Lilly, advancing to a trainer of other sales representatives, until his book came out. Then Lilly fired him.

Princess Health and A Cautionary Tale About Health Care IT in the Real World. Princessiccia

Princess Health and A Cautionary Tale About Health Care IT in the Real World. Princessiccia

electronic medical records Kaiser Permanente medical record confidentiality

Gusty 14:12 Add Comment

The Los Angeles Times reported another cautionary tale about the down-side of health care information technology (IT) in the real world. Apparently the Kaiser Permanente managed care organization, while testing electronic medical record (EMR) software, put up records of about 150 real patients on an unprotected web-site in 1999, and kept the web-site active until January 2005. Kaiser did not tell patients that their unprotected data had been available on the web for years until three months ago, according to the Times.
The problem first became public when a former Kaiser employee, Elisa D Cooper, posted about it, including links to the Kaiser web-site, on her blog. (I can't find her original blog, which may no longer be available on the web, but her current blog is here.) Kaiser then sued Cooper for invasion of privacy and breach of contract, even though, according to the San Francisco Examiner, she had been fired by Kaiser in 2003.
Beth Givens, the director of Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, commented that the incidents shows "just how vulnerable these systems can be." This is just one more case to think about the next time someone touts the EMR as the cure for all health care ills.
And it's also a reminder how large health care organizations, even ones with reputations as benign as Kaiser's is, at least out here in the East, react to whistle-blowers who publicly point out their managers' errors.

Princess Health and A Cautionary Tale About Health Care IT in the Real World.Princessiccia

Princess Health and A Cautionary Tale About Health Care IT in the Real World.Princessiccia

electronic medical records Kaiser Permanente medical record confidentiality

Gusty 14:12 Add Comment

The Los Angeles Times reported another cautionary tale about the down-side of health care information technology (IT) in the real world. Apparently the Kaiser Permanente managed care organization, while testing electronic medical record (EMR) software, put up records of about 150 real patients on an unprotected web-site in 1999, and kept the web-site active until January 2005. Kaiser did not tell patients that their unprotected data had been available on the web for years until three months ago, according to the Times.
The problem first became public when a former Kaiser employee, Elisa D Cooper, posted about it, including links to the Kaiser web-site, on her blog. (I can't find her original blog, which may no longer be available on the web, but her current blog is here.) Kaiser then sued Cooper for invasion of privacy and breach of contract, even though, according to the San Francisco Examiner, she had been fired by Kaiser in 2003.
Beth Givens, the director of Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, commented that the incidents shows "just how vulnerable these systems can be." This is just one more case to think about the next time someone touts the EMR as the cure for all health care ills.
And it's also a reminder how large health care organizations, even ones with reputations as benign as Kaiser's is, at least out here in the East, react to whistle-blowers who publicly point out their managers' errors.

Princess Health and CIGNA Can't Take a Joke. Princessiccia

Princess Health and CIGNA Can't Take a Joke. Princessiccia

CIGNA confidentiality clause free speech health insurance intimidation

Gusty 12:50 Add Comment

The Associated Press reported (see the Washington Post version) that the Dr. Douglas Farrago, the physician who edits the humor magazine Placebo Journal was threatened with legal action for publishing a satirical piece on managed care. The parody was of a patient satisfaction survey, by the imaginary "SICKNA Healthcare" managed care organization, signed by "W. E. Sucque" from the "Medical Thievery and Health Policy Division."
After the piece was published, his employer, Sisters of Charity Health System, received a call from CIGNA Healthcare's lawyers demanding the Farrago "cease and desist." Apparently, CIGNA Healthcare's contract with the hospital system bars physicians from "any false or disparaging communications which could, or are likely to interfere with or otherwise damage any of CIGNA's existing or potential contractual relationships." CIGNA spokesperson Lindsay Shearer suggested that the complaint arose from offended CIGNA employees, "our employees work very hard to provide high quality service to our members, our clients, our providers. And when they see stuff like that it upset them."
Perhaps CIGNA really does have some employees who are easily offended. Perhaps they were educated at some of the insitutions of higher learning, so well documented by FIRE, where a slightly offensive remark is grounds for charges under the local "speech code." (See this link for examples.)
However, it was CIGNA's lawyers, not its line employees, who went after Dr. Farrago. So maybe the company's heavy-handed approach to suppressing free expression will generate more bad publicity for it than Farrago's parody could ever have done.
I agree with Farrago's take on this, "If my hospital, who has allowed me the freedom to be creative, gets bullied to fire me over this then it proves that HMOs are really running our health care system."
File this one under "intimidation and coercion," sub-category "attacks on free expression."

Princess Health and CIGNA Can't Take a Joke.Princessiccia

Princess Health and CIGNA Can't Take a Joke.Princessiccia

CIGNA confidentiality clause free speech health insurance intimidation

Gusty 12:50 Add Comment

The Associated Press reported (see the Washington Post version) that the Dr. Douglas Farrago, the physician who edits the humor magazine Placebo Journal was threatened with legal action for publishing a satirical piece on managed care. The parody was of a patient satisfaction survey, by the imaginary "SICKNA Healthcare" managed care organization, signed by "W. E. Sucque" from the "Medical Thievery and Health Policy Division."
After the piece was published, his employer, Sisters of Charity Health System, received a call from CIGNA Healthcare's lawyers demanding the Farrago "cease and desist." Apparently, CIGNA Healthcare's contract with the hospital system bars physicians from "any false or disparaging communications which could, or are likely to interfere with or otherwise damage any of CIGNA's existing or potential contractual relationships." CIGNA spokesperson Lindsay Shearer suggested that the complaint arose from offended CIGNA employees, "our employees work very hard to provide high quality service to our members, our clients, our providers. And when they see stuff like that it upset them."
Perhaps CIGNA really does have some employees who are easily offended. Perhaps they were educated at some of the insitutions of higher learning, so well documented by FIRE, where a slightly offensive remark is grounds for charges under the local "speech code." (See this link for examples.)
However, it was CIGNA's lawyers, not its line employees, who went after Dr. Farrago. So maybe the company's heavy-handed approach to suppressing free expression will generate more bad publicity for it than Farrago's parody could ever have done.
I agree with Farrago's take on this, "If my hospital, who has allowed me the freedom to be creative, gets bullied to fire me over this then it proves that HMOs are really running our health care system."
File this one under "intimidation and coercion," sub-category "attacks on free expression."

Princess Health and "We'll Manage It the Way We Damn Well Want". Princessiccia

Princess Health and "We'll Manage It the Way We Damn Well Want". Princessiccia

executive compensation health care prices Mismanagement Phoebe Putney

Gusty 08:04 Add Comment

Phoebe Putney Health System is a health care system in Georgia, which boasts of "world-class medicine, hometown commitment." Its stated core values include "people come first," and "relationships are built on honesty and integrity."
Pheobe Putney was the subject of federal lawsuits, now dismissed, and state lawsuits alleging that it over-charged uninsured patients. It is one of the hospital systems that is now subject of congressional investigations of the not-for-profit status of hospitals and health systems. (See news article here.)
Now, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution has reported that top Phoebe Putney executives have run up lavish travel expenses for trips related to a for-profit subsidy. Pheobe Putney set up Grove Pointe Indemnity, based in the Cayman Islands, to provide the system with malpractice insurance. Top Phoebe Putney executives traveled to the Caymans, the Bahamas, and London, UK for Grove Pointe meetings. All travel was by private jet or first class on commercial airliners. Travel expenses included Cuban cigars, ($258 worth for one meal in London meeting), expensive beverages ($538 for one meal), and high-end accomodations (e.g., rooms at the Ritz in London, at 355 pounds sterling a night).
The Journal-Constitution asked Phoebe Putney Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Kerry Loudermilk about these expenses. Loudermilk first said what is lavish "is in the eye of the beholder." He responded to further questions about Grove Pointe, "We own it. We'll manage it the way we damn well want." A search of the GuideStar site for Pheobe Putney's 2002 Internal Revenue Service form 990 revealed that Grove Pointe had an income just under $2.5 million, and a total loss of just over $1.25 million in that year. Meanwhile, Loudermilk's total compensation was just under $3oo,ooo. He was one of eight executives who made more than $200,ooo. Three made over $300,000, and the system's CEO made nearly $600,000.
It will be interesting to see what the congressional investigation discovers about Phoebe Putney. Meanwhile, Loudermilk's response suggests that maybe the hired managers of this not-for-profit health care system feel a bit more ownership of it than they are entitled to. Although Pheobe Putney clearly owns Grove Pointe Indemnity, the managers of a not-for-profit do not own the organization. They should be running the organization in accord with its mission to benefit the public, which may not necessarily be the way they "damn well want." It's not clear that this job entitles them to smoke Cuban cigars on the health system's budget.