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Cost:
$25 for members; $45 for non-members

Location - Peabody Marriott,  8A Centennial Drive, Peabody, Mass.

Directions - Route 128 Exit 28 Forest Street/Centennial Drive

Program Description:

Dr. Stossel, a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and director of a new Division of Translational Medicine at Brigham & Women's Hospital, believes that medicine is spectacularly better today than when he started out over 40 years ago because of tools provided by science, but especially by private industry working with, educating, and remunerating physicians.

Yet, Massachusetts has passed regulations banning physicians from receiving gifts from pharmaceutical companies. This regulation grows out of a movement to keep drug companies from inducing physicians to prescribe their pharmaceuticals, thus cutting costs in prescription drugs.

In Massachusetts, applicable companies will be required to disclose any payments made to physicians and hospitals for research aimed at promoting a particular product. The first disclosures are due July 1, 2010.

Dr. Stossel believes the law has no substantive benefits, but it has opportunity costs in terms of inhibiting innovation and in obstructing transferring useful information to physicians and, especially, to their patients. He's advocating for innovators and providers of good service push back, or the regulation could get worse.

Our Speaker:

Dr. Thomas P. Stossel was educated at Princeton University and Harvard Medical School. He was head of Hematology and Oncology at Massachusetts General Hospital from 1976 until 1991, was Co-Director of the Hematology Division at Brigham & Women's Hospital through 2006. From 1976-1980 he was a consultant to the U.S. Department of State, investigating effects of microwaves on U.S. Embassy personnel in Moscow. Currently he is a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and director of a new Division of Translational Medicine at Brigham & Women's Hospital.

He is an active researcher and clinician and has published extensively on the stifling effects of over-regulation on innovation and ultimately on patient care. He is frequently sought after by news outlets to speak about restrictions on gifts and debunk the myth that financial incentives corrupt the practice of medicine.

His policy interests concern physician and researcher interactions with private industry. He served as President of the American Society of Hematology, for which he received its Dameshek and Thomas Awards. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Institute of Medicine. He is a member of the Board of Directors of Velico Medical, Inc. of Beverly, MA, a founding scientist of Critical Biologics Corporation, of Cambridge, Massachusetts, has worked in orphanages in Nepal and Zambia and trains service dogs.