"Health & Medical News"

An analysis of recent research testing the impact of noneconomic damage caps on the medical liability environment confirms that such reforms are successful, physicians and insurance industry experts say.

But consumer advocates and trial lawyers criticized the report as misleading. They argue insurers are to blame for high premiums and advocate that other changes are needed.

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Popularity: unranked [?]

After landing a first-round federal court victory against a 2006 New Hampshire prescriber privacy law, data-gathering firms are targeting similar laws set to take effect next year in Maine and Vermont.

Legislators in those two states, wary of a similar legal upset, shied away from a New Hampshire-style ban on any marketing use of prescriber data. Instead, they crafted legislation allowing physicians and other prescribers to choose whether drugmakers can access their prescription data.

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Popularity: 2% [?]

Washington — Gifts to physicians such as free lunches from drug and medical device reps soon could be listed on a national database so patients can evaluate whether money might be affecting their doctors’ prescribing.

The bipartisan Physician Payments Sunshine Act, introduced Sept. 6 in the Senate, would require drug and medical device manufacturers with $100 million or more in annual gross revenues to disclose names and office addresses of every doctor who gets a gift valued at more than $25. Drug samples and funding for clinical trials would be exempt. Failure to comply would trigger fines of up to $100,000 per violation.

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Popularity: 4% [?]