AMA Proposal on CME Funding a Threat to Shows

Michael Hart -- Tradeshow Week, 6/24/2008 3:29:00 PM

For many medical tradeshow organizers and exhibitors, news of impending government regulation of health care marketing (See “Regulatory Atmosphere is Issue No. 1 at HCEA” above) may not even be the most disturbing element of a new trend to limit their activities.

On June 15, a unit of the American Medical Assn., its reference committee on amendments, gave the provisional nod to a proposed recommendation that physicians and all health care institutions should accept absolutely no funding whatsoever from the private sector to support medical education.

If eventually approved by the AMA (a process that could take up to a year), the recommendation would cover residency and fellowship programs, speakers’ bureaus and – most importantly to tradeshow organizers and exhibitors – continuing medical education programs and related travel expenses at meetings, conventions and tradeshows.

The proposed recommendation came from the AMA’s Council on Ethical and Judicial Affairs. While there is still a lengthy process ahead before the recommendation would receive the AMA’s blessing, and even though it would still not be mandatory, many at the HCEA Annual Meeting & Exhibition were concerned about the potential implications.

The Pharmaceutical Research & Manufacturing Assn.’s PhRMA Code, limiting marketing activities, is not mandatory either, but very few companies in the pharmaceutical industry do not adhere to it.

“After all, PhRMA said maybe we should do something ourselves before somebody does it to us,” said Lucy Rose, managing director of life sciences, regulatory and capital markets for Deloitte & Touche.

More to the point for show organizers and exhibitors attending the HCEA meeting, Robert Batte, a partner in Conexus Health, asked rhetorically, “What do you think that will do the cost of your show?”

Batte said while the public’s desire to control health care marketing costs is legitimate, some of the recommendations for reform are unrealistic, referring to the AMA proposal.

“We have a very small number of people who convened in a very short time and tried to solve the world’s problems,” he said.