(calm music)
- The Open Payments program within the Centers for Medicare
and Medicaid Services provides transparency into
financial relationships between pharmaceutical and medical
device manufacturers (referred to as "reporting entities"),
and teaching hospitals, physicians,
physician assistants, and advanced practice nurses
(referred to as "covered recipients").
The program collects data from reporting entities
about payments they make to covered recipients
and makes it available to the public to shed light
on payments and other transfers of value
that take place each year.
CMS data for all active program years, dating back
to 2014, includes $59.69 billion in payments,
78.55 million total records,
more than 2,700 reporting entities,
1.1 million physicians, and 1,300 teaching hospitals.
The data shown is up to date for program years 2014
through 2020 as of June 30th, 2021.
Reporting entities are pharmaceutical companies,
device manufacturers,
and group purchasing organizations, known as GPOs, that
operate in the United States and produce
or distribute covered drugs, devices,
biological, or medical supplies.
Covered recipients include physicians, teaching hospitals,
physician assistants, nurse practitioners,
clinical nurse specialists,
certified registered nurse anesthetists
and anesthesiologist assistants,
and certified nurse midwives.
Open Payments data is reported
across three major categories: Research Payments,
Ownership and Investment Interests, and General Payments.
The General Payments category has several sub categories.
These subcategories are known as Natures of Payment
and include, but are not limited to:
consulting and speaking fees; honoraria,
gifts, and royalties; grants
and research charitable contributions; entertainment,
travel, lodging, food, and beverage;
medical education programs; and space rental
or facility fees. Research payments
and ownership or investment interests
involving covered recipient physicians
or their immediate family members must also be reported.
The Open Payments program operates on a yearly cycle
consisting of four key activities: Data Collection,
Data Submission, Review and Dispute, and Data Publication.
Reporting entities are required to collect payment data
on an ongoing basis.
In February and March, reporting entities submit
to CMS detailed information about payments or transfers
of value that they made to covered recipients
in the previous calendar year.
At the end of the data submission period,
there is a voluntary review and dispute period
to help ensure the validity of the data.
At this point, covered recipients can log
into the Open Payment system to view the data attributed
to them and dispute any inaccuracies
before the data is public.
Covered recipients work directly with the reporting entity
to reach a dispute resolution.
Reporting entities can make corrections to the data
as necessary depending on the outcome of the dispute.
The fourth and final step is the annual data publication.
CMS publishes the data by June 30th each year.
As you've just learned,
the Open Payments program operates on an annual cycle.
There are several key dates in this cycle to remember.
While reporting entities collect data all year long,
they submit the data they collected in the previous year
from February 1st to March 31st.
After that, covered recipients have from April 1st
to May 15th to review and dispute this data.
Any corrections to the data must be made
by reporting entities by May 30th.
By June 30th, CMS publishes the data on its public website.
It is important to note that all data provided
by reporting entities is published exactly as attested.
CMS does not alter the data in any way.
Open Payments data has been used in hundreds
of healthcare industry and mainstream media articles.
This publicly available data includes millions
of records, representing billions of dollars in payments
across all program years.
CMS has indexed the Open Payments data so that it is easy
for anyone to conduct searches by physician,
teaching hospital, or company,
as well as by medical specialty and other parameters.
You can search Open Payments data
at openpaymentsdata.cms.gov.
The Open Payments program promotes a more transparent
and accountable healthcare system.
Learn more about the Open Payments program
at cms.gov/openpayments. Paid for
by the US Department of Health and Human Services.