Other Articles

How to Get the Surgeon’s Attention
Understanding relationship dynamics and having the chutzpah to put your best creative foot forward can garner you real success as a sales rep. Find out how to bring inventiveness to the sales process so as to attract and retain the surgeon’s attention.

Death Spiral
Since January, ReGen Biologic's stock has fallen from $0.95 per share to $0.04 per share. The number of shares outstanding is up 45% in 9 months. In one case, the company paid a $24,000 vendor bill with 68,572 shares of stock. Still, a couple of particularly savvy orthopedics investors have bought roughly 7% of the stock. Can ReGen survive?

Diving in to the Future
Since 1996 total knee procedures have risen 77% to 455,000 annually. A study presented at AAOS estimates that by 2030 that number grows to 3.48 million knee replacements a year! If infection rates continue to rise at current rates, however, that future will not be nearly as rosy for either patients or industry. Read on.

Selling Yourself: Career Advancement for Sales Reps
Are you considering becoming a distributor or do you plan to advance within a company? Either way, you need to be ready. You will want to know how to make product line choices, hire a sales force, and lead others, among other things.

Mission Unaccomplished: Are the Wheels Coming Off at the FDA?
The FDA is no longer able to fulfill its mission and its wheels are coming off. So says the FDA’s own Science Board in a scathing report. We looked under the hood of the report and here’s what we found.

“Back” to the Future Part II: Technology and the Vertebral Compression Fracture Market
In Part I, our inquiring analyst, Matt Menze, highlighted opportunities for spinal implant manufacturers in the vertebral compression fracture (VCF) market. Now he tackles the thorny issue of new and emerging VCF technologies. What’s on the horizon? Read on.

Second Careers for Orthopedic Surgeons
How should you plan for a change in focus later during your career? You may want to continue utilizing your research, managerial, or presentation skills. Find out what Drs. Ray Linovitz and Stephen Hochschuler have to say about how to stay involved in the field at any stage of one’s career.

Finally, Consolidation in the Allograft Industry
So, where’s Adam Smith’s enlightened self interest when you need it? For about the length of the average U.S. Presidency it’s been clear to anyone who could read an income statement that one important market sector was in need of consolidation. That sector is allograft. With RTI and Tutogen merging, it may finally be happening. Read on.

The Smell of Favoritism, Political Interference, and Back-Room Dealing Alleged in Ortho Deferred Prosecution Deal in Jersey
Amid charges of political favoritism, New Jersey Congressmen call for investigation of ortho deferred prosecution agreements. It’s Jersey and the fur’s flying, read about it here.

The Match Process: Let the Courtship Begin
In the first of three articles, two medical students describe their experiences of the residency match process. Learn their thoughts on interviewing, letters of recommendation, and of course, the pressure to match.

A New “Wave” of Extremity Treatment?
Addressing a market of more than a quarter of a million patients annually with a $5-8,000 treatment sounds like the next multi-billion market. FDA approved, but controversial. What is Extracorporeal Shock Wave Therapy and why should we care? Read on.

Avoiding the Perp Walk, or How to Keep the Justice Department From Knocking on Your Door
We’ve all seen the “Perp Walk” on TV. The defendant cuffed and trying to hide his or her face from the cameras. Will Justice Department and congressional investigations of industry and physician relationships result in a doc taking that walk? Read what a federal prosecutor says about avoiding that indignity.

Private insurers and CMS have been jumping all over the quality measurement healthcare bandwagon, looking to make better decisions about where to spend healthcare dollars. How the metrics of measurement are designed, determining who wins and who loses, will provide fodder for much debate and disagreement. Ultimately, as is usually the case in the U.S., a court will be asked to decide the merits of those metrics. Now the first litigious swing has been taken in New York.

New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has sent letters to health insurers Aetna and Cigna warning them that their planned programs ranking physicians on the basis of quality and cost measures would likely confuse or deceive customers. Last month Cuomo sent a letter to UnitedHealthcare, warning them to cancel their plan to release physician rankings based on quality and cost data, or face legal action.

Cuomo is questioning the insurers' use of claims data to rank specialists. The attorney general claims that the data do not contain complete information, which can lead to skewed rankings. He also said that insurers have a profit motive to recommend physicians who cost less but might not be the most qualified. The attorney general also reportedly asked Aetna and Cigna to provide details about the criteria they use to rank doctors, how the insurers measure a physician's performance, and what incentives are used to steer patients to or away from providers.

Bloomberg reported that Linda Lacewell, counsel for economic and social justice at the attorney general's office, in a letter to Aetna's general counsel James Brown, wrote, "This program carries significant risk of causing consumer confusion, if not deception," adding, "The attorney general is committed to fostering transparency on behalf of consumers."

Aetna spokesperson Cynthia Michener said the company would "cooperate fully," because "Aetna is fully committed to transparency." Cigna spokesperson Wendell Potter said, "We take the attorney general's concerns seriously and will respond to his request for information."

Having politicians interject themselves into quality and cost measurement metrics should be plenty of incentive for insurers and medical societies to join together and agree on appropriate data-gathering systems. If they don't, it will be done for them.