The initiative will disclose all data, but cannot name individual recipients without their consent
By the end of June at the latest,, 25 innovative pharmaceutical companies doing business in Croatia will for the first time publish online the names of doctors and health institutions connected to monetary transfers of value during the last year, reports Poslovni Dnevnik on June 12, 2016.
This includes donations and sponsorships, lecture fees, data on travel costs, accommodation and participation fees for professional meetings and congresses.
The amounts will be published individually for doctors who agreed to public disclosure with the pharmaceutical company they work with. Those who have not consented will be shown grouped, without revealing identity, the Innovative Pharmaceutical Initiative (IF!) points out, representing 25 manufacturers of innovative medicaments on the Croatian market.
As there is no financing model for the education of doctors in Croatia, the Croatian Health Insurance Institute (HZZO) enabled pharmaceutical companies through an Ethical Contract to invest in cooperation with doctors and pay for the cost of their participation in professional conventions.
Based on the Ethical Contract, which very strictly regulates rules and conditions under which such a transfer is possible, pharmaceutical companies have been sending data to HZZO for five years on these transfers, this being the first time they are made public.
“We are proud that the pharmaceutical industry is the first in the world to publicize data on the transfer of value, aiming to achieve complete transparency and additionally advance cooperation and exchange of knowledge of innovative pharmaceutical industry with health workers and organisations,” IF! president Tatjana Tomljanović says.
“It is our joint responsibility,” Tomljanović adds, “to bring medical innovation closer to patients and enhance treatment outcomes, for which quality cooperation between the industry and health workers is needed.”
Since the IF! is a member of the European Association of Innovative Pharmaceutical Companies, Croatia is one of 33 states obligated by the codex of the organisation to publish the data.
Although the pharmaceutical industry aims to encourage doctors to give their consent for public disclosure, the Initiative notes that this number varies from state to state.
