Whistleblower: Possible Teva Illegal Kickback Scheme

[Marco]

According to a federal lawsuit recently unsealed, Teva payed local doctors thousands of dollars in kickbacks to prescribe Copaxone and the drug Azilect for Parkinson's Disease.


Company insiders say Teva was pushing Copaxone to offset the loss of its patent and a projected $550 million loss in sales. Greg Demske serves as the nation's chief attorney for the Inspector General at Health and Human Services in Washington D.C.



"If the physician is receiving money, that may influence the physician to choose to prescribe a drug; and a particular drug even if it may not be in the patient's best interest," Demske said, highlighting the threat to patient care.


The government attorney says the schemes are often hidden in what's called "speaker" or "educational" programs, which are not illegal


The problem comes when the program is used as a cover for kickbacks.


Hidden kickbacks


For example, "Doctor A" presents or educates "Doctor B" about a certain drug. Then "Doctor B" turns right around and educates "Doctor A" on the very same drug during the same meeting. It often happens over a pricey meal, paid for by the drug company.


In addition, both doctors get paid a fee, anywhere from $500-2,500 for sharing information the doctors already knew.


In some cases, Demske found, "People are paid even when no meeting actually ever took place."


http://www.wthr.com/story/29267597/w...-local-doctors
http://assets.fiercemarkets.net/publ...es/13-main.pdf

[rdmc]

Hey Marco,

Thanks for the information.

Here's a link to an article from Wheelchair Kamikaze. It's about Big Pharma and doctors, very enlightening.

http://www.wheelchairkamikaze.com/20...on-makers.html

Also there's a great video at the link about Marketing to Doctors, and a link to a site where you can see what each physician is being paid by pharmaceuticals.

[Maple25]

no surprise

I asked my neuro if Copaxone was available in a certain country and if so, how would I get it delivered. He asked the pharma rep and forgot to delete the part where he asked for his honorarium. I am sure everyone is doing this, they just push different treatments.
The last neuro I went to is very found of Gylenia and prescribed it without doing an ECG. He just looked at me and said that nothing ever bad happens on Gylenia and I don't look like someone who has a heart problem… Turns out all his patients are on Gylenia.

[Maggie2015]

this is something all of us should know--thank you!

Hi, it's Maggie.

I'm on Copaxone, prescribed by the very neurologist who has not listened to me about my chronic and severe back pain from spasticity since I first brought it up to him in January 2015. It's June 2015, and my back pain is now crippling and has vastly limited my mobility over time.

Copaxone is my neurologist's favorite topic and he will take an hour-long appointment to tell me all about it. The only time he has set up an appointment with me since our first appointment, when he prescribed Copaxone, has been to follow up on Copaxone. He had me come in for a baseline MRI shortly after I started Copaxone, and he discussed it with me only in terms of Copaxone (he warned me we might never be able to tell if it was "working").

He had me come in for the bloodwork I would need after starting Copaxone. He said he'd have it drawn in his office but he forgot to have one of the two samples drawn and I had to spend 5 hours arranging to have it drawn at my local lab, going there, and making sure it was sent to his office. After he got the results from the bloodwork, he had me come in for a scheduled appointment and talked to me about how the bloodwork showed I was tolerating the medication well, and then he made a long convoluted speech about how the 40 mg dose I am taking three times a week may eventually no longer be accepted by my insurance company and told me that if that happened I needed to get one the one day a week dose.

I think it was during that visit that I brought up my back pain for the first time. Reading this, I wonder if he'd only allotted a certain amount of time to make sure I stayed on Copaxone, and so when I told him about my back pain and how it was getting worse that hadn't been on his agenda, and so he dismissed it.

I don't want to be a conspiracy theorist, but I think there's definitely something to all of this.

Hah! Just had a thought! Now that I've lost my health insurance, I will probably need to go off Copaxone.

Now THAT will probably catch my neurologist's attention. He might even be willing to see me in his office!!!

I could bargain with him--I could say, I'll go back on Copaxone when you help me with my back pain!

Forgive the sarcasm here. Marco, thank you for the original post. rdmc, thank you for the link to the wheelchair kamikaze--this guy is SMART! Maple23, oh, thank you for sharing the story about your neuro forgetting to delete the part about asking for his honorarium. That is really good to know.

Maggie

[Maggie2015]

OMG! My neuro has taken $18,267.27 from Teva Pharmaceuticals in the last 2 years!

Hi, it's Maggie.

I am stunned.

I checked all the links provided by Marco and rdmc and the Wheelchair Kamikaze (through rdmc) and I just found out that my neurologist has received $18,267.27 from Teva Pharmaceuticals in the last 2 years.

Thank you so much, so, so much, for giving me the tools to learn this fact. You are angels.

Maggie

[its2much]

Teva Fined by the FTC

$1.2 billion for their interference with generic provigil. I seem to recall Teva doing the same for generic Copaxone.

[rdmc]

Hi, it's Maggie.

I am stunned.

I checked all the links provided by Marco and rdmc and the Wheelchair Kamikaze (through rdmc) and I just found out that my neurologist has received $18,267.27 from Teva Pharmaceuticals in the last 2 years.

Thank you so much, so, so much, for giving me the tools to learn this fact. You are angels.

Maggie

It's an eye opener for sure. I found that one of our local MS neuros was "rolling in the dough" from speaking at the MS chats put on by different drug companies. He beat your neuro as far as $$$.

I complimented my neuro last week when I was there for my 6 month check in. I told him about the link, and told him it said he had received something like $68 worth of food....and that was it. Hey, he has a large staff, so $68 probably covered donuts or a light lunch.

What I was surprised at was that bit about being able to track Rxs that were written by a neuro. I always thought that must be possible, but I didn't know how.

Anybody who hasn't visited Marc's link (wheelchair kamikaze)...if you don't want to read the entire article, go listen to the video, the guy is funny, but lays out the marketing schemes that are in practice.

[Thinkimjob]

Can't say I'm surprised. Lemtrada went from $6000 a treatment to $60,000 a treatment.

And Copaxone's makers are more scared of the no-need-to inject drugs than the generic brands,

Have a look at your doctor's pen and notepad next time. There's a drug company name on that. Is that the drug they've recommended?

Very easily bought, I'd have thought.

[JerryD]

Dirty tricks...? Can you imagine ?

[its2much]

Been Going on for Years

and it's done by all the drug companies.
When I was first diagnosed several years ago, I went to four doctors to confirm the diagnosis. Two doctors would only prescribe Rebif - they wouldn't even discuss any other option. At that time I was a single mom with three young children - there was no way I could be sick every other day using Rebif.

[Maple25]

It's an eye opener for sure. I found that one of our local MS neuros was "rolling in the dough" from speaking at the MS chats put on by different drug companies. He beat your neuro as far as $$$.

I complimented my neuro last week when I was there for my 6 month check in. I told him about the link, and told him it said he had received something like $68 worth of food....and that was it. Hey, he has a large staff, so $68 probably covered donuts or a light lunch.

What I was surprised at was that bit about being able to track Rxs that were written by a neuro. I always thought that must be possible, but I didn't know how.

Anybody who hasn't visited Marc's link (wheelchair kamikaze)...if you don't want to read the entire article, go listen to the video, the guy is funny, but lays out the marketing schemes that are in practice.

I just checked my doctor in this list. Misteriously he disappeared, I haven't seen him in years since I quit going there because I moved but he is not listed entirely in any state. But I found his clinic and one of the docs raked in about 30,000 in a month from Biogen. Scary.