Potomac River Partners recently put together an infographic of CMS Open Payments data, which provides an interesting look at the “General Payments” to physicians from manufacturers. Click on the image below for a magnified view.
The infographic displays some useful benchmarking information, including graphs that plot the average amount companies spent on meals, consulting, education, and compensation for services other than consulting. Another chart contains the top 10 drugs by dollar amount spent. Notably, 7 of the top 10 drugs from 2013 remained in the top 10 for 2014, and 8 of the top 10 are co-marketed drugs.
Potomac River Partners also breaks down the industry-wide payment totals by looking at the variations in Natures of Payments by month, finding that Royalty payments fluctuated the most month-by-month, while consulting fees and food and beverage, for example, had minimal variation.