Representative Koutoujian Introduces Legislation to Stop Drug-Switching Payments - 12/12/2007
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – December 12, 2007 Contact: Kathleen Skarin 617-722-2130
Representative Peter Koutoujian, the House chairman of the Joint Committee on Public Health, today filed legislation prohibiting the state’s health insurance carriers from providing incentive payments to physicians as an inducement to switch their patients from one prescription drug to another.
Rep. Koutoujian filed the legislation in response to media reports involving $100 incentive payments being made by health insurers to doctors for switching patients from the name-brand cholesterol-lowering drug Lipitor, which does not have a generic alternative, to a generic of an entirely different drug, sometimes without patient’s knowledge. “Patients should feel confident they are being prescribed the most effective medication based on their doctors’ best judgment,” said Koutoujian. “It’s inappropriate for insurers to hold payments over doctors’ heads in a blatant attempt to influence prescribing decisions.”
An Act Prohibiting Drug Switching Payments amends state law governing health insurance consumer protections by making it illegal for insurance carriers’ contracts to include a specific payment to the participating provider as an inducement to change a prescription for a drug or medical product from one specific drug or medical product to another.
“Doctors should be free to make medical decisions based on what is best for their patient as opposed to what is best for some big business,” said Koutoujian.
Patient advocates expressed strong support for Chairman Koutoujian’s bill. "Kudos to Chairman Koutoujian for siding with the patient and for drafting language that strikes an appropriate balance between legitimate attempts to control health care costs and economic inducements that are designed to interfere with the clinician-patient relationship,” said Tim O’Leary, Deputy Director for Policy with the Massachusetts Association for Mental Health.
"This bill addresses one of the critical concerns that all of us in the healthcare field have and that is patient safety," said Dr. Leslie G. Brody, President and CEO of the Epilepsy Foundation of MA and RI.
“The language of this bill will help protect the important doctor-patient relationship and protect it from undue outside influences,” said Anne Whitman, President of the Cole Resource Center.
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