Background
In accordance with the IPHA Code of Practice, since 2016 details of how companies engage with and support Healthcare Professionals (HCPs) and Healthcare Organisations (HCOs) have been publicly disclosed on www.transferofvalue.ie, a public website with disclosure information from up to 50 companies including non-IPHA members. Transfers of Value (ToV) for research and development, donations and sponsorship (including medical education), consultancy fees, registration fees and travel costs to attend events are disclosed on this website.
The primary purpose of the collection and processing of ToV data is to increase transparency. Interactions between the pharmaceutical industry and HCPs can have a profound and positive influence on the quality of patient treatment and the value of future research. At the same time, the decision of a HCP to prescribe a medicine is one of the key pillars of the integrity and effective functioning of the healthcare system.
The RCSI recognises the importance of working collaboratively with industry. The RCSI’s website states that “Through our industry partnerships we are addressing major healthcare challenges.”
The Medical Council guide references its members ‘attending educational meetings or receiving payment of reasonable fees for professional services to commercial enterprises’. Further, ‘the Medical Council accepts that payment of travel and accommodation expenses for doctors to attend meetings, either as participants or speakers, supports the aim of continuing professional development’.
FAQs
Pharmaceutical companies publish specific ToVs made to HCPs and HCOs on www.transferofvalue.ie.
The data is comprised of direct and indirect transfers of value (whether in cash, in kind or otherwise), made, whether for promotional or other purposes, in connection with the development and sale of prescription-only medicinal products exclusively for human use.
GDPR includes the requirement for a balancing test. As part of that balancing test IPHA has identified and implemented additional safeguards resulting from our duty of care. We therefore delete data on the ToV website after three years as part of the agreed safeguards put in place for processing of all data. While we make important data public, we balance this with the privacy needs of the individual HCPs. The three-year timeline is used in many countries across Europe for Disclosure so it would be seen as a typical time period for such data to remain in the public domain.
According to the Data Protection Commission (DPC) opinion the safeguards put in place by IPHA ‘to implement the principles of data minimisation and to protect the fundamental rights of data subjects, and the implementation of protocols to protect the data from search engine indexing is particularly welcomed’. It also stated that ‘This should ideally mean that the information will only be available to persons who seek to access it for legitimate purposes, and it will be protected from webscraping or other harmful practices.‘ (See the full DPC opinion here).
This is part of the outcome of the IPHA balancing test required under GDPR. It is one of the additional safeguards IPHA has identified and implemented resulting from our duty of care. While we make important data public, searching by individual HCP has not been enabled to balance with the privacy needs of individual HCPs.
According to the Data Protection Commission (DPC) opinion the safeguards put in place by IPHA to ‘to implement the principles of data minimisation and to protect the fundamental rights of data subjects, and the implementation of protocols to protect the data from search engine indexing is particularly welcomed’. It also stated that ‘This should ideally mean that the information will only be available to persons who seek to access it for legitimate purposes, and it will be protected from webscraping or other harmful practices.‘’ (See the full DPC opinion here).
IPHA has implemented a number of safeguards to discourage the use of the data on www.transferofvalue.ie for additional purposes, such as preventing the indexing of the data through search engines.
According to the Data Protection Commission (DPC) opinion the safeguards put in place by IPHA to ‘to implement the principles of data minimisation and to protect the fundamental rights of data subjects, and the implementation of protocols to protect the data from search engine indexing is particularly welcomed’. It also stated that ‘This should ideally mean that the information will only be available to persons who seek to access it for legitimate purposes, and it will be protected from webscraping or other harmful practices.‘’ (See the full DPC opinion here).
In 2015, IPHA initiated the disclosure of companies’ financial interactions to HCPs to hasten a move towards greater transparency. Currently, some HCPs don’t permit the publication of their names on www.transferofvalue.ie. However, our aim is 100% individual-level disclosure for HCPs. One of the ways that our companies are addressing this is the use of legitimate interests as the legal basis for the disclosure of ToV information. This different legal basis also reduces the administrative burden on the HCP.
It is of note that the disclosure rate for ToVs for HCPs is currently at 96% in respect of 2023 data which is a 17% increase on 2022 data.
We are pleased to note that there is a 100% disclosure rate by member companies in relation to ToVs to HCOs.
