The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) published data every year, and similarly, they published Open Payments data for the year of 2021. This data was for the previous program years hence it includes the payments/transactions that took place between January 1st and December 31st.
The applicable manufacturers reported a total of $10.9 billion payments or transfer of value (ToV) to healthcare professionals and organizations (HCP/Os) in 2021.
Now what’s interesting is that although life sciences and biotech companies tend to submit data to the CMS as per the rules and regulations imposed by the government – what they fail to realize is that this data can be accessed publicly, and the value it offers can be unlocked and accessed.
This can be done either by using qordata’s data-driven compliance suite, specifically by Compliance Data Analytics. With millions and billions of transactions being uploaded and recorded within our data-driven platform, you can derive much more than information regarding spending on HCPs/Os.
For the data made public in 2021, the total amounts reported by 1,700 companies was $3 billion more than as compared to the one reported in 2020. Other details from the earlier mentioned 1,700 companies include a total of 12.1 million records attributed to 533,056 physicians and 1,237 teaching hospitals.
The newly released Open Payments data is the first year of data to be released since the program expansion brought about by the Substance Use-Disorder Prevention that Promotes Opioid Recovery and Treatment for Patients and Communities Act of 2018 (SUPPORT Act).
The SUPPORT Act added additional provider types as covered recipients for data collection, including:
- Physician Assistants
- Nurse Practitioners
- Clinical Nurse Specialists
- Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetists
- Anesthesiologist Assistants
- Certified Nurse Midwives
There were over 3.5 million payments made in 2021 against 233,471 additional non-physician practitioners accounting for almost $121.5 million of the spend for the year.
In total, the new practitioner types accounted for 29% of all transactions, but only a little over 1% of the total value reported.
According to the data published by CMS, $2.55 billion was attributed to general payments.
Research payments totaled $7.09 billion, while ownership and investment interests accounted for $1.26 billion. Ownership interest remained almost identical to amounts reported in previous years.
General payments increased by approximately half a billion dollars, while the largest jump was seen in the increase in research spend for the year 2021. Research spend reportedly increased by more than one billion from the year 2020.
Food and beverage amounts for the year 2021 were nearly identical to years prior to the pandemic.
This likely accounts for the additional practitioner types added as covered recipients as well as the beginning of a return to pre-pandemic activities, including in-person and virtual meals.
This publication is also the first year in which the new nature and purpose categories (acquisitions, debt forgiveness and long-term medical supply or device loan) were reported.
Long-term device loans and debt forgiveness accounted for around $19 million in payments each while acquisitions had approximately $325 million in payments attributed to it.
The publishing of the 2021 Open Payments data and the increase in overall spend serves as a reminder for companies to review their compliance policies and procedures related to HCP/O interactions. Ensuring accurate and complete reporting should continue to be a priority.Â
To learn more about how qordata can help support your Open Payments reporting obligations, feel free to contact us.
