April 4, 2013 — Headlines run by news outlets regarding the status of industry-physician relationships rarely focus on the benefits of those relationships, according to an April 3 article in Policy and Medicine. Instead, “news outlets are continuing their misleading headlines and stories regarding physician-industry collaboration over the last few weeks by relying on the recently updated payment

data posted by ProPublica and its Dollars for Docs campaign,” the article states. It outlines news coverage in five states from news organizations that used the Dollars for Docs database as the basis for their stories.

“Focusing on the negatives and ignoring the positives of industry-physician relationships is both misleading and detrimental to the public health,” said Coalition for Healthcare Communication Executive Director John Kamp. “The public and the press need to be aware that without these important and necessary collaborations, healthcare innovation and patient quality of life would most certainly suffer.”

To read the full story, go to: http://www.policymed.com/2013/04/physician-payment-sunshine-propublica-database-leads-with-disparaging-headlines.html