MHA 614: Policy Formation & Leadership in Health Organizations

Healthcare Practices that Cause Conflict

The healthcare organization has many layers of business. When one enters the hospital they are focused on how they are going to get well, and not what business plans are being made. In most businesses there are sales and marketing; this proves to be the same for any healthcare organizations. As a result there are many influences on the healthcare market, causing professional conflict for healthcare practices. It sounds complex, but is considered the norm in the healthcare arena.

The problem with the marketing influences is it takes away from the seriousness of patients’ health. Each pharmaceutical company, medical equipment company, or the supply companies are working hard to promote their new products. Their marketing tactics does not always involve the reactions or needs of the patients. The goal is to make the healthcare facilities and their physicians think their product is the best for their organization or patients.

Three healthcare practices that create conflict are gifts (including meals), provision of pharmaceutical samples, and grants for research projects (Harrington & Estes, 2008). The three listed practices were chosen due to the high volume of usage. They are the ones that you most frequently notice being used. At times these practices have been known to cross the line when it comes to the patients’ wellbeing. It is viewed as sacrificing the patient’s health for a dollar.

Giving gifts (including meals) is a way the particular promoting organizations work to manipulate the different healthcare organizations and physicians. This is done when the healthcare organization is given lunches, pens, tablets, highlighters, and bags for promoting a certain medication or product. What better way to have an organization focus on your product, than to have them see the product name ever time they write a note. This makes the product name more familiar in the facility, hopefully to encourage the use of the particular product.

Providing pharmaceutical samples to doctor’s offices and private practices is another way of healthcare practices creating conflict. This was a practice that has been used for years. A pharmaceutical representative would visit a healthcare facility; then meet with the manager/administrator to inform them of how wonderful their product is. At the end of the information session the pharmaceutical representative would leave samples of the medications to use or have their patients to try. The goal of leaving samples is to promote their product, in hopes that the physicians will prescribe their medication on a regular basis. This would work in their favor of increasing their profits. Then one has to ask, which is more important: the patients or the profits?

Lastly there are the grants for research projects. This is another healthcare conflict that is continuously addressed. This is carried out when a particular pharmaceutical organization or medical supply company provides grants to research facilities. This is done with the goal that the research facility would complete research studies using their products. This would give the pharmaceutical companies adequate data about the created medication or product. This is just another way to strong arm the health care system.

According to the Wall Street Journal Europe, “conflicts of interests may influence research, education and clinical decision-making in ways that compromise clinical integrity and patient care, and may lead to increased health care costs” (Stossel, 2012). It is suspected that different pharmaceutical organizations promote their new drug, but the cost is extremely high for patients. Because of this “the Obama administration is finally poised to enact badly needed regulations requiring that the manufacturers of drugs, medical devices and medical supplies disclose all payments they make to doctors or teaching hospitals. The information, which would be posted on a government Web site, will allow patients to decide whether they need to worry about any possible conflicts of interest (New York Times, 2012).

Years ago the issues discussed were not considered to be conflicts of interest. If a pharmaceutical rep came to a healthcare facility to give a presentation about their new medication, and brought lunch or goodies was only a plus. This is from the healthcare staff’s opinion only. At times medication samples are the only way patients can get their medications, so this is considered a plus also.

There are many healthcare conflicts of interest that have to be taken into account. There are new regulations that have been passed by the government to help mandate these conflicts. There are now websites that patients can review for information about gifts received by their doctors or healthcare facility. There is a good understanding for the need to market new products for sale to these healthcare organizations, but it should not come at the expense of the patients.

In conclusion, some of the medications that are being promoted by the companies are too expensive for the patients to buy. So after they are done with samples, they are without their medications finding themselves noncompliant. I work in the insurance realm of the healthcare, and see this situation on a daily basis. The doctor prescribes the medication, the insurance company does not pay for it (not on the formulary), and the patient is without the medication. My solution would be for all healthcare organizations and physicians to turn their priority focus to the patients. After review of a patient’s medical records and health history, the physician will then evaluate which medication should be prescribed. I think the doctors should go back to researching for themselves. They should research which medication is best for the patient, not a drug rep pushing the new cholesterol statins. Prescribing medications should be done on a personal, patient by patient basis; not on the basis of what’s new on the market. If the focus is placed solely on the patients this would reduce some of the created healthcare conflicts.

References

Harrington, C. & Estes, C. L.(2008). Health policy: Crisis and reform in the U.S. health care delivery system (5th ed.). Sudbury, MA: Jones and Bartlett.

Thomas P. Stossel. (2012, January 24). Who Paid for the Doctor’s Bagel? Wall Street Journal (Europe), p. 16.  Retrieved from ProQuest Newsstand.

Who Else Is Paying Your Doctor: [Editorial]. (2012, January 21). New York Times (Late Edition (east Coast)),  p. A.22.  Retrieved from Banking Information Source.