The Treatment Trap: Cardiac Society Draws Bulk of Funding From Stent Makers

Saturday, May 14, 2011

Cardiac Society Draws Bulk of Funding From Stent Makers

by Charles Ornstein

Cross-posted from ProPublica, May 13, 2011

A poster for the Boston Scientific drug-coated stent at a conference in 2006. Boston Scientific is one of the biggest funders of the Society for Cardiac Angiography and Interventions. (Thomas S. England/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

A Pittsburgh hospital informed 141 patients earlier this year that they may have received unneeded angioplasties and stents, the tiny mesh tubes inserted to keep arteries open.

A Towson, Md., cardiologist faces a hearing on the fate of his medical license after being accused of implanting stents unnecessarily in more than 500 patients.

And this week, a new study found that more than half of patients with stable heart disease who received angioplasty and stents didn't first receive medications, as scientific guidelines recommend.

While a host of lawsuits and research studies has raised questions about the overuse of stents, the group that represents cardiologists who implant them relies heavily on income from the makers of these devices.

The Society for Cardiac Angiography and Interventions (SCAI)received 57 percent of its revenues in 2009 from medical device and pharmaceutical makers, according to financial information on the group's website.

Industry contributions to the society's budget covered $4.7 million of the $8.2 million it received that year.

The group's biggest funders are the companies with the biggest share of the stent market: Cordis Corp. (a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson), Boston Scientific, Abbott Laboratories and Medtronic.

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Rosemary Gibson

Rosemary Gibson is the author of The Treatment Trap, which puts a human face on the overuse of unnecessary medical treatment. For policymakers in the White House and Congress who are reforming health care, it offers a ten-step recovery plan to pay for health care reform wil also improving care and reducing harm from overuse. For consumers, it offers twenty smart steps to avoid overuse.

As Senior Program Officer at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in Princeton, New Jersey for sixteen years, Rosemary was chief architect of its $200 million national strategy to establish palliative care in the mainstream of the U.S. health care system. Now, more than 1400 hospitals have palliative care programs, an increase from about 10 in the 1990s. She was honored as the recipient of the 2007 Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine.

Gibson worked with Bill Moyers and Public Affairs Television on the PBS documentary, "On Our Own Terms," which showed to more than 20 million viewers how the U.S. health care system can better care for seriously ill patients and their families. She supported the work of nurse and physician leaders who launched faculty development programs in palliative care, revised medical and nursing textbooks to include the care of dying patients, expanded palliative care content on medical and nursing licensing exams, and initiated a series in the Journal of the American Medicinal Association, "Perspectives on Care at the Close of Life."

She has made her mark as a national leader in patient safety. She is the author of the critically acclaimed book, Wall of Silence, which contains narratives of patient experience with medical errors. The book tells the human story behind the Institute of Medicine report, To Err is Human. Wall of Silence was reviewed in the Journal of the American Medical Association and Health Affairs, referenced in proceedings of the U.S. Senate, mentioned in Congressional testimony, noted in The Wall Street Journal and the Boston Globe, and highlighted in the anniversary issue of O Magazine.

Rosemary has given keynote presentations to health care professionals that provide the perspective from the other side of the bedrails, of patients and families, on the urgency of patient safety. In academic settings, she has been a guest lecturer at the University of Michigan Graduate School of Health Administration, Loyola University School of Law, the Dartmouth Clinical Microsystem Symposium, and Georgetown University and the National Board of Medical Examiners, among others.

Earlier in her career, Gibson served as Senior Research Associate at the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based public policy organization; as Vice President of the Economic and Social Research Institute, a policy think tank; and as consultant to the Medical College of Virginia and the Virginia state legislature's Commission on Health Care. She also served as a volunteer and Board member at a free medical clinic in Washington, D.C.

She is a graduate of Georgetown University and has a master’s degree from The London School of Economics.

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Saturday, May 14, 2011

Cardiac Society Draws Bulk of Funding From Stent Makers

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