Academic detailing - meet the drug rep who came back from the dark side

The evidence of Kristin Nocco's competitors was easy to see as she walked into Dr. Melanie Jewell's waiting room in South Philadelphia early one morning this month.

There was information about Alzheimer's disease from Namenda and about the shingles vaccine from Merck, a word search puzzle from Rozerem ("Your dreams miss you") and tissues from Nasonex and Ambien.

These are the kind of token gifts that pharmaceutical sales representatives - known as detailers - leave behind after lauding their employers' latest drugs.

Nocco, a pharmacist and former detailer herself, is an "academic" detailer.

She is paid to sell the truth, or at least Harvard's version of it.

Her unusual job is to give doctors objective information about the cost and benefits of all kinds of treatments, including diet and exercise. Her work is supported by the state of Pennsylvania's PACE program, which helps more than 300,000 poor senior citizens pay for their medications.
The goal is to foster better care and maybe save PACE, which spends $600 million a year on drugs, some money in the process.

"If you just practice smart, you'll be able to give better care and, by the way, save money," said Jerry Avorn, a Harvard University internist and drug expert whose team of doctors is paid by PACE to scour scientific studies and create the reports that detailers like Nocco give doctors.

Much more here.