(By the way, the Times has gone to a pay-wall, so the above link to it can't be counted on to work for too long after this posting comes out. Try a search engine. There's no permalink as one used to use to make sure the link stayed put.)
In any case, how fitting it all seems in anything-goes Nevada. The Feds may or may not be going after this egregious example of conflict of interest--let's hope they are. But at least we can make sure that what plays in Vegas doesn't stay in Vegas.
Apparently some of the cardiologists at UMC are (or were) pulling down 5k a month in consulting fees. That may or may not have anything to do with the fact that the small German device-maker went from having, oh, zero 2-3 years ago to 95% of their pacemakers implanted there last year, by total number of patients.
Good work, gentlemen. Let the word go out. Come to America and roll the dice in Las Vegas. It's almost enough to make me want to become a brimstone-spouting right wing pastor. "To gamble, it's of the devil."
But this is a place where the new governor (Republican, as of the beginning of this year) is a former chair of the gaming commission.
Of course, the real culprit here is, collectively, those cardiologists. According to the article, the cardiologists who didn't enroll their patients (and presumably take dough) were on what Biotronk's sales guys called the "loser" list.
Yes, "winning" in health care is about market share and effective sales. We know that already, of course, from Wendell Potter's Deadly Spin, with which most readers of this blog are no doubt already familiar.
It sure as hell isn't about the patient winning. Last time I checked, professionalism and the Hippocratic Oath have something to say about the patient being the one who's supposed to win.
In this same vein, loss of meaning, clearly the word "university" in hospitals' names has ceased to have much real meaning. Alas, that's equally true across the rest of the country. Maybe just a wee bit more in Vegas.
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