Lilly's Payments To US Doctors Fell 11% in 2010

Eli Lilly & Co.'s (LLY) payments to U.S. doctors and other health-care professionals for certain services in 2010 declined 11% to $72.7 million versus 2009, the Indianapolis-based drug maker said Friday.

Lilly spokesman J. Scott MacGregor said there was no specific reason for the decline, attributing it to a "year-to-year fluctuation." The health-care professionals were paid for providing consulting services to Lilly, or for speaking to doctors and patients about Lilly products and certain medical topics.

The payments--posted on the company's website--are the latest example in a trend toward more transparency by drug makers, which have been criticized for using payments to doctors to unduly influence prescribing patterns, or to promote unauthorized uses of drugs.

The companies defend the payments as necessary to help conduct research and to educate physicians about the authorized uses of their drugs.

Lilly in 2008 became the first pharmaceutical company to announce plans to disclose its payments to U.S. doctors, which it began doing in 2009. The number of health-care professionals receiving payments from Lilly declined in 2010 to 4,925 from 5,169 in 2009.

MacGregor said the 2010 spending comprised $61.5 million for health-care professional peer-to-peer educational programs, $7.1 million for patient education programs and $4.1 million for consulting.

Lilly said it works with physicians to help "translate scientific discoveries into practical, real-world use for patients," and to foster better understanding about the risks and benefits of its medicines.

Although Lilly initially began disclosing physician payments voluntarily, such disclosures were required under the terms of a 2009 settlement of federal allegations that it improperly promoted the antipsychotic Zyprexa for unauthorized uses. Lilly plans later this year to release additional data required by the settlement, including payments for drug research-related services.

Pfizer Inc. (PFE) and Cephalon Inc. (CEPH) also have been required to disclose certain physician payment data as part of settlements of government probes of allegedly improper marketing practices. Others, including GlaxoSmithKline PLC (GSK), Merck & Co. Inc. (MRK) and Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), have voluntarily begun disclosing varying levels of physician-payment data.

Under last year's U.S. health-care overhaul legislation, all drug makers will be required to begin collecting uniform data on physician payments in 2012, and to report the data to the government beginning in 2013. The government plans to make the data available in a publicly searchable database.

Supporters of the federal law say the disclosures will help foster greater accountability, and will inform patients about any financial relationships between their doctors and drug manufacturers.

-By Peter Loftus, Dow Jones Newswires; +215-982-5581; peter.loftus@dowjones.com

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