No Word From CBO Yet on Mohs
In November 2008, the Mohs Coalition, made up of the American Academy of Dermatology, the American College of Mohs Surgery, the American Society for Dermatologic Surgery, and the American Society for Mohs Surgery asked the Congressional Budget Office to determine how much Medicare's 2007 multiple-procedure payment reduction rule has saved the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. The CBO has not yet responded, said AAD President David Pariser at the annual meeting of the American College of Mohs Surgery. Dr. Pariser said that the rule has had an adverse impact on Mohs surgeons. Because of fears that the technique is being overused, "people are shooting darts at Mohs," Dr. Pariser said. He encouraged Mohs surgeons to begin gathering data about the value of their work. The coalition is also mulling whether to request a national coverage decision from CMS for Mohs.
AAD Launches Lexicon
The American Academy of Dermatology launched DermLex, an online database of dermatologic terms that had been in beta testing for several months (SKIN & ALLERGY NEWS, March 2009, p. 11). "With widespread electronic health record adoption on the horizon and patient safety and quality of care always a top priority for dermatologists, this database can assist all physicians in the correct interpretation of a patient's dermatologic history," said Dr. Pariser in a statement. The AAD intends to eventually equip the database with online tools to work with electronic medical records.
Company Would Grow Derm Role
GlaxoSmithKline has offered $2.9 billion for Stiefel Laboratories Inc. If the deal closes, the combined entity would be one of the largest dermatology specialty companies in the world. The new company would still operate as Stiefel and continue to offer such brands as Duac, Olux E, Soriatane, Bactroban, Cutivate, and Altabax, according to GSK. Combined revenues for the two companies would have totaled $1.5 billion in 2008, and accounted for 8% of the global prescription dermatology market. Stiefel stockholders have already approved the acquisition, but it still has to be given a green light by federal regulators. GSK said that it expects the transaction to close some time in the third quarter of this year.
HHS Launches Lupus Campaign
The Department of Health and Human Services, in cooperation with the American College of Rheumatology and other health care organizations, has launched a national advertising campaign to educate women about lupus. "Despite its prevalence in the United States, lupus is rarely discussed and often misunderstood among women in our country," said Dr. Wanda K. Jones, deputy assistant secretary for women's health at HHS. A recent study by the Ad Council found that about 80% of women aged 18–44 in the United States have little or no knowledge of lupus.
PhRMA Revises Trial Standards
The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America has revised its voluntary standards for how drug manufacturers run clinical trials and communicate trial results. The new PhRMA standards call on drugmakers to register on a public Web site all interventional clinical trials—including some phase I studies. The standards also call for companies to "greatly expand transparency in medical research" by providing summaries of results from all interventional clinical trials, regardless of whether the research is discontinued or the medication being studied is ever approved. Finally, the new standards call for drugmakers to adopt the authorship standards of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors.
New Web Site Pushes Reform
Doctors for America, a new grassroots physician organization, is launching a campaign to get physicians' voices heard on health care reform. The group's "Voices of Physicians" campaign has collected comments nationwide and put them on the Web site
Small Promo Items Have Influence
Subtle exposures to small promotional items, such as notepaper with printed logos, influences attitudes of medical students toward pharmaceutical brands, a study in the Archives of Internal Medicine showed. However, medical school policies on pharmaceutical advertising might affect whether students' attitudes toward drug brands are favorable, the researchers noted. At one institution, where a strong school policy warned against persuasion tactics underlying pharmaceutical marketing, the students had more negative reactions to a brand-name drug after exposure to small promotional items. At another institution, where no such policy was in place, students had more positive reactions to the same product after promotional item exposure. An editorial accompanying the study noted that medical schools have been slow to enact widespread restrictions on academic-industry interactions.