Hmmmmm.....I don't recall receiving a check from Pfizer or from the makers of the paper I use for my EKG machine. I suggest you see a gastroenterologist about pulling your head out of your @!$%#.

These journal articles amount to nothing more than bought and paid for advertisements. Failure to identify these articles as such should be criminal. There is a major lawsuit going on now against DuPuy over faulty hip implants that I am sure were being touted by these paid mouthpieces.

While most MDs do not make the kind of money in kickbacks described in this article, there is a small minority that are slimy and will sell their ethics without even thinking about it. This minority, along with the medical device and drug manufacturers that are paying them off should be prosecuted for the fraud they are perpetrating on the public and the rest of their profession.

People should realize that mos doctors, between paying for their medical school loans, support staff, office space and equipment, malpractice insurance, etc., make very little money for the hours they work. The reimbursements they get from medicare and the insurance companies have been going down in real dollars for years. Only the top specialists are making big money. Internists, GPs, and the like make no more than any other professional occupation. The doctors also work very long hours. When I had surgery a few years ago my doctor was at the hospital early in the morning for the surgery and was still around at 9 pm stopping by to see how I was doing. He was also around on the weekend checking up on how I was doing. Most people would not want to put up with the hours for what most of these doctors make.

Wow JS-My husband is a physician and you hit it right on the nose. People don't have a clue what it takes to be a doctor anymore and then to get out owing so much money. We are playing catch up since we owe so much, started so late and salaries have gone down. Reimbursements get lower every year. Thanks for writing this and noticing what most people miss. I can't believe all the people that think we are "rich" when in all reality we have way less money than someone who has been working in a good job since college.

U.S Representative PETE STARKS wrote a law that was supposed to help prevent this. Instead it just put an end to drug companies providing BIC pens for the nurses. Now they have to buty their own and unscrupulous doctors continue to deceive other doctors as well as the population in general. As usual, the government screwed up with a law and probably will not fine the manufacturers or the doctors who took the money.

I agree with piniw. This is not MOST doctors. It is a few who, just like a few judges, legislators, Wall street bankers, etc. think they are above the law. Corruption is everywhere. It should not be tolerated especially in doctors who are supposed to be helping sick people, not taking advantage of them.

Be very careful here, MOST MD's [in various specialties] DO NOT recieve money from big pharma, implant companies, etc. There are a select FEW in a huge health care industry who do take R&D royalties, or stipend from work actually done on design or clinical trials from said sources. They earned it! That's called initiative, ingenuity...free market capitalism. There are a select FEW, regardless of profession who blur those ethical guidelines for personal gain. [Medicine, Law, Religion, Corporate, Finance and the like.] That's not right. I'll never defend those bums.

But let us not indict the whole of any local level enterprise because of the outrageous acts of a relative few, especially the medical practitioner. We were just raped in legislative reform. Now if Big Pharma, the Insurance industry and disreputable Lawyers aren't curtailed in their access to Washington via lobbyist, then we all are mistaking capitalism for corruption. Ten-Fifteen years ago parma reps did quit spending needless the cash on local docs. They should have. That was money that could have dropped the price of medications. Too bad it didn't. It went from Wall Street to Pennsylvania Ave. Now IS the time for them and the like to STOP spending it on Capital Hill!! If [Merck, Smith & Nephew, or J&J] can't even take me to dinner, or pick up the tab for MY Time spent listening to their selling points, or give me a ball point pen, then tell my why should Congressman-X be able to accept a gagillion $$$! of PAC money for his/her's ill disguised, pathetic magnanimously selfish re-election coffer? That's not "good government." That's greed! And that's not what I and MOST of my medical colleagues are about. Show me others who spent as much time in pursuit of, and ultimately work as many hours in, and who CONSTANTLY have every one from buerocrats and ambulance chasers to self righteous ignoramususes calling them on how they ought to do their job! Last night, after working till 7 pm in the office, I was on call. Ultimately back in the ER till 1 am; treated 2 patients. After reducing two fractures and splinting them myself I was back home for 3 hours sleep. One patient had insurance...Medicare. For my work, worry, liability exposure and lost sleep and fatigue today ...I might collect $300. Thank you, but don't preach greed to me. By the way, tonight is my night at our local free clinic till nine; 2 docs, a PA and nurses. Greed huh, next time straighten our your own damn wrist. I'm asleep!

James, good for you and I agree.

The doctors, insurance, and pharmaceutical companies are all in bed together. Put up the bed rails, give them a community bed pan, it's a synchronized rip off. The lawyers are part of the bed covers.

By all means, we need to eliminate these ads for every blessed disease and discomfort real or imagined. They are as harmful as cigarettes and hard booze are purported to be. the damn remedy with side effects is worse than most of the original problems.

Save your favorite hypochondriac and neurotic. Call you rep and senator to remove these ads.

Wow JS-My husband is a physician and you hit it right on the nose. People don't have a clue what it takes to be a doctor anymore and then to get out owing so much money. We are playing catch up since we owe so much, started so late and salaries have gone down.

So then it is ok for doctors to take millions to write articles that are suppose to be unbiased and useful rather than bought and payed for? Personally I think it shows a lack of any personal morals on the part of the doctors who choose to sell their articles.

Lauren those are a select few and I fully agree with you. There is corruption in every profession and we all know that. How many lawyers make money in unethical ways? Or politicians? Of course it is not okay for these doctors to do this-I would never condone that. I'm just saying let's not turn this into a "doctors make to much money" discussion which tends to happen. My husband has never gotten more than a blanket (literally) from a drug company.

Regulations!!!

You mean to say that the unregulated "free market" of medicine is not working? Physicians are like all other humans and prone to greed and to the need for glory, at all costs? You mean pharmaceutical/medical device companies and doctors are not doing what they do to actually help people? That they would bias a product to make it profitable, even if it may harm the "consumer" (patient)?

Say it aint so... I thought doctors were doctors because they had a passion for life.

Seriously, the "advertising" dollars for pharma companies need to have some major oversight. Every time I see a drug commercial, I start talking at the tube. Especially when the side effect list is mumbled off. My kids think I'm crazy.

Don't doctors that take this money like this realize they are nothing short of whoring themselves out? They are all like hookers, with at least one STD. And pharma is the pimp, baby.

Start by lobbying your congressperson to get pharmaceutical ads off TV. Once they lost access to us, they realized that having access to YOU was way more effective. Because you'll walk into my office and ask for the little blue pill, or the big purple pill, and that power of suggestion is way more effective than any pen they could give me, or any dinner they could buy me.

Trust me I would love too. But see I don't have the billions at my disposal to lobby congress. Like the drug companies did to make it possible. Maybe if the AMA, APA, along with the physician members would stand up and speak out, there could be some influence.

The vast majority of physicians want that stuff off the air. But, because we don't have a powerful lobby to speak for the majority of physicians (the AMA is NOT the most popular organization among physicians, believe it or not) and we don't donate hundreds of thousands of dollars to politicians, our voice is not heard. Whoever spends the money in Washington gets the face time.

(the AMA is NOT the most popular organization among physicians, believe it or not)

I've actually heard that.I just couldn't recall any other organization that most doctors are affiliated with.

As for the rest, all I can do is shrug my shoulders and educate my kids. Because I certainly don't have the money to donate.

racknshack..........is 100% correct the ads should be outlawed.......in fact some of the ads actually caused the disease they were supposed to cure..............RLS...restless leg syndrome can have onset through the power of suggestion....note cases went through the roof when the ads were on tv...tinnitus too........they will do anything to make money..including actually playing with your mental health.

The average surgeon makes over 500K? I call bulls*it. Maybe the average cardiothoracic surgeon makes over that, but not the run of the mill general surgeon doing gall bladders and appendixes. Get your facts and your spelling straight before you publish such crap.

i know for a fact that the average surgeon salary is around $200,000. The average GP is now hovering $100,000. That may seem like a lot to some people but after all the school, training, debt, etc I'd like to see how many people think it's a lot of money after actually doing it. And jolly joker, seriously you are comparing a surgeon to an auto mechanic. I'd like to see you put the life of a loved one in an auto mechanics hands. My husband went to school for 16 years, worked 100 plus hours a week training and made little money. And furthermore we have never gotten any kickback more than a pencil.

Really? The hospital paid for my education? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Dude you are SO out of touch with the financing of medical education in this country. You should be banned from this board your comments are so outrageous.

So that justifies doctors taking money in order to endorse a product, in scientific journals? A product that could mean life or death?

I don't think so....

Maybe you should get your priorities straight.

Where did I say it was justified? Of course it's not. I'm just commenting on the absurdity of this comment that a hospital and a drug company paid for my school.

Then why belittle people who are fed up with big money? Fed up with greed at a human expense. That's all your doing. Yes I understand your frustration in dealing with the BS out there. The insurance rules vs the hypochondriac. The mother who insists her child gets antibiotics every time there is a sign of the sniffles. The regulars who are addicted to pain pills. Believe me, I get it. But see, just like you, we're human. Explain, yes. Hell yes! Tone down your anger just a bit.

I'm angry because when I see comments such as what started this particular thread, my impression is the general public feels that physicians are all looking out for the 'big payday' and don't care a whit about helping people. I'd gladly tar and feather the orthopedists that published misleading information, but when we're all painted with the same tarry brush I get pissed off.

Your anger shows loud and proud. Put it away. Educate people and stand your ground. Best form of "revenge" on a forum, is being absolutely correct against people who pull out the conspiracy theories and such. They will eventually skulk away. You don't have to look the "interwebs" people in the eye. You have to face yourself, your loved ones and your patients.

@RackNStack: More than 10 years ago I worked with a team of doctors. They all were in practice, but were also assistant professors at a Medical School. The numbers of medical students that dropped out of medical school to go to law school were disappointing. They opted for law school because that's where the money is. Their numbers increased every year. Medicine is definitely not where the money is and as such, is losing it's lure on the best and the brightest in the US. Those who go into medicine do so because they love it.

Law school is where the money is??? Ha Ha Ha ha Ha........There is an absolute glut of attorneys.

I do agree with you that people become physicians because of a love of science and/or a desire to care for people.

Well Jolly Joker- My turkey husband is still paying off $200,000 of debt at 9%. No one has given us anything but long hours, all night long phone calls, 24/7 call, and a very stressful job as an "auto mechanic". We get no bonuses b/c hospitals are broke and as I clarified earlier-we are FAR from $500,000 as you think doctors make. You are what is giving doctors a bad name when most just want to help people, make a nice living, and deserve the money they are making after all the training. Do you know my husband used to work 120 hours a week and make $28,000 all while accruing $10,000 a year in interest from student loans. Look up facts before you spew stuff on here.

You said it way more succinctly then I ever could. And you bring up a good point how most of these people blasting physicians would never accept this lifestyle for themselves. I doubt many of them could last a month doing what we do.

By letting companies bribe their way through research, are we not setting ourselves up for being a third world medical community? I am frankly sick and tired of hearing doctors tell us of all their woes. Lots of people work hard, long hours without nearly as much money as you guys still earn. And many of those same people can often not get good medical care in the US. I am one of those. I work long hours actually as an executive in a medium size company. We even have health insurance, though we have had to continually down grade it in order to survive. So when I had a major illness a few years ago, incidentals and such ended up wiping out my savings. Go talk somewhere else about your trials and tribulations. I'm tired of hearing from spoiled doctors who have no clue that most of the rest of American works pretty hard too.

And it's the doctors fault you are under-insured? Most of your bills most likely come from drugs and the hospitals and hospital equipment. The people who wrote the new health care bill were "Big PHARMA", the insurance companies and the Senators on the committee. Dr.s who were present were escorted out and arrested. Go to Frontline (google it) and see who decided how your health care would be provided.

I know a lot of other people work hard but do you take call for 48 to 72 hours straight on weekends like private practitioners do and work from 0700 to 1800 every week day? When your computer crashes, are you fearful of being sued by its family? A group of 4 doctors in a practice means that one of them is available for for call a full 24 hours every 4th night and still be in clinic a minimum of 4 days a week.

Also, blame the government for business being so bad. You have had to down grade because of the economy unless you are in insurance or an executive for a pharmaceutical company.

Doctor, with all due respect, just because you're not getting paid doesn't mean others aren't. Maybe it is because you did take the high road. Those surgeons who were writing for medical journals didn't, and you know it.

This really isn't about the high cost of medical care. It's about unethical endorsements of products used in the medical treatment of people. Should doctors make more money than me? Yep. I'm skilled and well trained, but not to the extent any doctor is. Do doctors need to make over a million just to say a drug or medical device works? Better not. Do doctors need to be wined and dined in order to prescribe certain drugs? Hell no. Who would ever be able to trust that product. And if that product turned out to defective enough to hurt people? How could that doctor even look at himself in the mirror?

That handful (41 of which made over $1,000,000) had influence over what other doctors prescribed and recommended to patients.

That is what is the issue. Most people understand the price of becoming a doctor. It's just a handful of people who don't. But, for the most part, that handful have no influence over life and death decisions.

I like your reply. You basically said what I meant to say and got sidetracked by all the B.S.

I never said what these guys did wasn't unethical. I very well realize that most arthroscopic surgeries for mensical tears are unnecessary. However, when I tell patients that in the office, they simply think I'm denying them care and go find another primary care physician who will tell them what they want to hear.

What pisses me off is the brush that people on here use to paint all physicians as greedy businessmen and the gross inaccuracies that people assume are fact.

Thank you! I mean that.

You can't get sidetracked from the truth.

As for the patients, I honestly think an awful lot of people are in love with health care. Don't know what else to say. I only go when I have strep throat. My 16 year old daughter only went when she had a fever I couldn't bring down (106), and my 4 year old son, when he decided to be Spiderman (stitches).

RackNStack and tallicagrrl:

Look at you two go. If the two of you had combined your posts at the beginning of this thread, there would have been little left to say. Thanks to both of you.

It wouldn't have hurt my feelings one teeny bit if you had hit the insurance companies harder. I'm a bit of a nut on proper language and I would like to see everyone use proper terms, so we could deal with the real problems. It's not health insurance. It's ILLNESS insurance.

It's not lawyers who are taking in vast numbers of multi-million dollar malpractice verdicts, it's the THREAT of a lawsuit.

The CEO's who head up the "health Insurance corporations" are absolutely, unequivocally nothing more than bean counters. In no way can they justify their staggeringly gross salaries.

Yes, the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth is the answer. But we have to be certain we are speaking the same language and understand the terms.

Thanks again.

Haha!

I'm thinking of changing my primary to the good doctor :-). We absolutely ended up being on the same page.

Hitting the insurance companies...well that's for another time. I'm sure in the near future.

Why is it that I think of insurance premiums as shake down money? For patients and doctors. Hmm?

My uncle was the head of a hospital and a cardio/thoracic surgeon. He told me the same thing and that was in his kitchen in 1976. He was only referring to malpractice insurance at the time. The pharmaceuticals and personal health insurance have only added to the damage, but malpractice attorneys started this trend.