July 1 Deadline Quickly Approaches for Pharmaceutical Industry
Cegedim Dendrite Helps Companies Report Gifts and Payments to Physicians

BEDMINSTER, N.J.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--For the nation’s pharmaceutical companies, July 1 may be as dreaded as the April 15 tax deadline.

On that date, all companies providing promotional gifts or other payments to prescribing physicians in Maine and District of Columbia must submit exhaustive reports to the respective governments. If the companies do not, they potentially face millions of dollars in penalties, as well as negative media coverage.

“Companies respond to these regulations in several different ways,” says Bill Buzzeo, Vice President and General Manager, Cegedim Dendrite’s Compliance Solutions, which provides the industry’s most comprehensive automated product for filing gifting and payment reports, known as State Guardian™.

“For the most part, companies comply with the regulations by generating the reports internally, either manually or with customized applications,” Buzzeo says. “But in some cases, companies simply do not comply.”

Maine and the District of Columbia are among a growing number of states that require pharmaceutical companies to report any payment or gift exceeding $25, ranging from the physician’s participation in a clinical research study to a free lunch for the office staff.

Other states that require detailed reports are West Virginia, Minnesota, and Vermont, with California and Nevada requiring companies to post their reports online for public viewing. Of the seven, Vermont has taken the most aggressive action by imposing penalties for non-compliance. Meanwhile, there is pending legislation in 15 other states.

As of now, these prescriber gift and payment laws do not exist at the federal level, but that may change in the near future. The U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives are considering bills that would be more comprehensive than the current state laws. For instance, pharmaceutical companies would have to document their gifts and payments to physicians participating in Medicare and Medicaid programs.

Cegedim Dendrite, which has vast experience with pharmaceutical operations data and government regulations, just announced the latest version of its State Guardian technology and services solution. By using this product, pharmaceutical companies would be able to compile and prepare the required gifting reports automatically, thus removing a tremendous administrative burden. Another benefit is that companies can finally obtain multiple views into their aggregate spending at the prescriber, product, and event levels.

With packages available for large, mid-tier and small life sciences companies, State Guardian is completely scalable, so its capabilities will increase as the gifting legislation becomes more widespread. For instance, a small or emerging pharma or biotech company might choose an entry- level version that submits the required reports, while a larger company might require features that allow planning “what-if” scenarios. The most robust version also allows large pharmaceutical companies to fully customize State Guardian and integrate it with their existing enterprise applications.

About Cegedim Dendrite

Cegedim Dendrite provides the pharmaceutical companies around the world with vital support for successful Customer Relationship Management (CRM) activities. With nearly 200,000 sales representatives using its products worldwide, Cegedim Dendrite is the world's leading CRM provider for the life sciences industry. This business unit, created in May 2007 when the France-based CEGEDIM S.A. Group acquired Dendrite International, also provides sales, marketing and regulatory compliance solutions in more than 80 countries. To learn more, please see our website: www.cegedimdendrite.com.

About Cegedim

Founded in 1969, Cegedim is a global technology and services company specializing in the healthcare field. Cegedim supplies services, technological tools, specialized software, data flow management services and databases. Its offerings are targeted notably at healthcare industries, pharmaceutical companies, healthcare professionals and insurance companies.

The world leader in pharmaceutical CRM, Cegedim is also one of the leading suppliers of strategic healthcare industry data. Cegedim employs more than 8,000 people in 80 countries and generated revenue of €753 million in 2007. To learn more, please visit our website: www.cegedim.com.