Minnesota's 1993 physician payment disclosure law (the first in the nation) was an awful mistake, at least according to one Minnesota doctor.

Dr. Dan Carlat has a piece up about the recent ACRE meeting. (Association of Clinical Researchers and Educators). As Dr. Carlat puts it:

Why is ACRE so very ripe for satire? Because it consists of rich doctors complaining that they want more money from drug companies, and such an organization lacks any inherent credibility, and seems, frankly, absurd.

Some wags have suggested that the acronym stands for Academics Craving Re-imbursement for Everything. Others have suggested that the forum be renamed: Forum for University Corporate Kickbacks in Education as Determined by University Professors.

Carlat's meeting report is hilarious and will hopefully be read by pharma defenders at the U of M medical school.

And one of our own comes in for special mention:

But the eeriest presentation came from one J. Michael Gonzalez-Campoy, an endocrinologist who was flown out on the ACRE-jet from Minnesota. His job was to convince everybody that Minnesota’s 1993 physician payment disclosure law (the first in the nation) was an awful mistake. His tactic, theoretically, was a good one. “The law has been terrible for patients,” he declared, speaking in the ominous tones of a doctor notifying you of grim laboratory results.

“Oh boy,” I thought, pen poised, “finally, some data on the effects of transparency laws on patient outcomes.”

But alas, Dr. Gonzalez-Campoy’s evidence base amounted to a single patient, a 73 year old man with severe diabetes.

“Do you know what drug he was on?” He asked incredulously. “The cheapest drug money will buy—Glyburide….When I asked my patient why he was on that drug, I was appalled by his answer. He told me that his PCP said it is the most cost-effective drug.”

It got worse: the patient had apparently been reading newspaper articles saying bad things about the newer diabetes drugs, like Avandia. The kicker was when he told Dr. Gonzalez-Campoy that “I’ve read that doctors are getting brain-washed by drug companies to prescribe these drugs.” Don’t you see what the Minnesota disclosure law has wrought? Patients getting prescribed generic medications. Patients reading the newspaper. Patients questioning the morals of their physicians.

“Please learn from our mistakes,” Dr. Gonzalez-Campoy, now impassioned, concluded. “Massachusetts should have asked us before they passed their law. They didn’t.”