Endocrine Abstracts

Recently, special attention has been paid to the relationship between doctors and the pharmaceutical industry. The aim of this work was to evaluate the attitude of Tunisian endocrinologists towards pharmaceutical promotion.

Methods: It was a cross-sectional study based on an anonymous 9-item survey about the attitudes and behaviors of physicians towards the pharmaceutical promotion. The study included 120 participants.

Results: One-third (34.2%) of the physicians didn’t complete the survey. We analyzed the responses of 75 participants: 32 residents and 43 specialists. The inexpensive gifts were appreciated by the majority of participants. Costly gifts were judged less frequently appropriate, especially by specialists (P < 0.001). However, these expensive gifts were received or desired by many participants, and significantly more by residents than specialists. Among residents, 9.4% and 15.6% thought that respectively their prescriptions and those of their colleagues would be highly influenced by promotion (P = ns). This difference was significant among the specialists: respectively 4.7% and 35.3% (P = 0.002). Training about conflict of interest is inadequate or non-existent according to 96.8% of residents and 97.6% of specialists (P = ns). Contact between learners and medical visitors was to be prohibited based on 9.4% of residents and 36.6% of specialists (P = 0.007).

Conclusions: The majority of participants confirmed that they received or wanted to receive gifts from the pharmaceutical industry, but they said that this did not affect their prescriptions. Literature shows that gifts, however small, are very effective in subtly changing the therapeutic attitudes of physicians. Awareness is needed to ensure an independent medical prescription in our hospitals.