The medical device industry’s lobbying spend hit its highest point since 1998 last year, nearing $33 million, as the industry stepped up its campaign to repeal the medical device tax enacted as part of Obamacare.
Medicare’s Sunshine Act database is slated to go public later this month with a year’s worth of data on industry relationships with physicians, but an alliance of life sciences groups is calling for some sunshine of its own.
A massive alliance of medical societies urged Medicare regulators this week to keep physician pay data from the public for an extra 6 months, time that doctors can use to peruse their profiles for inaccuracies about their financial relationships with medical device and drug companies.
The proposal would keep physician financial data under wraps until March 31, 2015, rather than Sept. 30, 2014, as planned.
MASSDEVICE ON CALL — A group of 17 medical device makers met in a forum in Tennessee this month and pledged their support to forming the Greater Memphis Medical Device Council, a non-profit group focused on medtech industry issues.
Medical technology lobbying group AdvaMed announced this week that it won approval from Chinese authorities to open an office in Shanghai, an important emerging market for many of AdvaMed’s largest member companies.
Incoming AdvaMed chairman Jose Almeida has an international outlook, planning to focus his 2-year leadership tenure on several goals that aim to reconcile initiatives in the U.S. with efforts overseas.
MASSDEVICE ON CALL — Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) is ramping up his opposition to the medical device tax, spending some time with his medtech stakeholders to renew his call to repeal the tax.
LifeScience Alley president & CEO Dale Wahlstrom is stepping down from his post after 10 years, making way for organization insider Shaye Mandle.
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