US healthcare plan sets up new drug research agency

Consumer advocates are especially pleased with one provision of the newly enacted U.S. healthcare reform bill—a provision that sets up an independent agency to compare treatments.

The new nonprofit Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute gets a steady stream of funding from three sources, and a board of experts appointed by the Health and Human Services Secretary who are supposed to be free of obvious conflicts of interest.

The goal is to save money and improve health care by cutting through the confusing mass of information put out by drug companies promoting their products.

“If I am a doctor, most of the information I have comes from the pharmaceutical representative who comes to my office. That is not independent science,” said Larry McNeely of the Public Interest Research Group.

“Often times there is a much more effective treatment out there that physicians just don’t know about. This will begin to ensure that this won’t happen so much,” McNeely added in a telephone interview. “This is heck of a start.”

National Pharmaceutical Council President Dan Leonard agreed. “Helping to inform health care decision making through comparative effectiveness research ... has the potential for positively impacting patient health,” said Leonard, whose group sponsors such research.

The House and Senate were putting finishing touches on the legislation on Thursday, and it will be signed for a second time by President Barack Obama.

The overhaul of the $2.5 trillion healthcare system aims to extend health coverage to an estimated 32 million Americans who do not have health insurance now. It also takes some steps to coordinate the disorganized mix of private enterprise and government care unique to the United States.

Obama and his advisers have from the beginning stressed comparative effectiveness research as an essential piece of reforming healthcare.

Companies rarely compare new drugs to older treatments, but instead against placebos. By law, regulators approve drugs based on their safety and effectiveness—not on whether they are better than other therapies.

But in 2006 the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute did its own study and found that cheap, generic diuretics used to treat High Blood Pressure were better than expensive brand-name drugs for preventing heart failure.

“That is a perfect example,” McNeely said.

“We think comparative effectiveness research is a critical piece of setting the stage for long-term cost containment and long term quality in our healthcare system.”

Similar provisions were in both the House and Senate versions of the bill, but in the end, the Senate version won out with an independent nonprofit conducting the research and getting the word out on its findings.

“It doesn’t in any way mandate the use of this information in making coverage decisions. It is solely designed to equip physicians and patients with information,” McNeely said.

Funding comes in part from $1.1 billion set aside in last year’s stimulus measure along with some funds from the Medicare and Medicaid government insurance programs. A third stream comes from a tax on health insurance companies.

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By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor

WASHINGTON (Reuters)