title: The consequence of secret prices: the politics of physician preference items.
abstract: This paper assesses the implications for policy of recent aggressive efforts by manufacturers to enforce price-confidentiality clauses in contracts with hospitals for purchases of physician preference items (PPIs) such as implantable medical devices. Secrecy clauses prevent hospitals from revealing prices to third parties that help them negotiate prices and to surgeons who specify which device brands and models hospitals purchase. Litigation focused the attention of journalists and policymakers on problems that result from the asymmetry of information between buyers and sellers in the market for PPIs. Legislation is pending.
authors.affiliation: ECRI Institute in Plymouth Meeting, Pennsylvania, USA. jlerner@ecri.org
authors.forename: Jeffrey C
authors.initials: JC
authors.lastname: Lerner
authors.forename: Daniel M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Fox
authors.forename: Todd
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Nelson
authors.forename: John B
authors.initials: JB
authors.lastname: Reiss
mesh_terms: D003132:Commerce; D001026:Coronary Artery Bypass; D003362:Cost-Benefit Analysis; D013677:Medical Laboratory Science / Q000191:economics*; D009204:Myocardial Revascularization; D019982:Organizational Case Studies; D010820:Physicians; D019736:Prostheses and Implants / Q000191:economics; D019057:Quality-Adjusted Life Years