UK pharma reassured over dealings with health bodies
pharmafile | May 3, 2011 | News story | Medical Communications, Sales and Marketing | 2011 ABPI Code, Code of Practice, medical communications, risk-sharing
UK pharma has been reassured over the use of risk-sharing schemes with health bodies.
The latest revisions to the ABPI Code of Practice – which took effect on 1 May – arrived with new information on how pharma can interact with health bodies.
They included updated guidance on risk-sharing, with the Code saying it “does not preclude risk-sharing schemes” as long as any refunds always go to a health authority, trust ‘or the like’ and never to individual health professionals or practices.
Pharma had been concerned that risk-sharing schemes, which allow health bodies to seek a refund if a drug fails to meet certain expectations, would be prohibited under the new version of the ABPI’s Code of Practice.
Instead the guidance requires an agreement to be drawn up in advance as to when a refund or other recompense would be due.
Doctors’ magazine Pulse said the new guidance will also allow pharma to make risk-sharing deals with emerging GP consortia.
Dr Charles Alessi, a GP in Kingston, Surrey told Pulse that GP consortia would now be able to negotiate risk-sharing agreements with pharma companies applying outcome targets to use of drugs.
Alessi said: “It used to be impossible to have a conversation with pharmaceutical companies about anything other than drugs. Now it’ll be possible to have a conversation about a pathway.
“These changes in the ABPI code help with the development of the relationships between consortia and the pharmaceutical industry. The potential for us to develop better care for our populations is significant,” he said.
The Department of Health told Pharmafocus however that GPs are not yet legally entitled to engage with pharma on these types of financial deals.
The new GP pathfinders will still need these deals to be undertaken by their primary care trusts, at least until a new legal framework is introduced allowing GPs to negotiate with pharma, the DH said.
2011 ABPI Code of Practice
Revisions in the new version of the Code of Practice include a ban on pharma companies from providing branded promotional aids to doctors.
In addition, from 2013 firms will be required to annually declare the total amount they pay to doctors and others for services such as conference speeches, along with the number of consultants they employ.
The Code also states that patient access schemes – which allow for deals to be struck with the Department of Health for more expensive drugs – are ‘acceptable in principal’, but pharma must ensure that they are carried out with conformity and in line with the 2009 PPRS agreement.
Ben Adams
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