ISTOCKPHOTO.COM, DRA_SCHWARTZ
In 2009, the US government made a major investment in the kind of research that pharmaceutical and medical device companies loathe. Along with tax relief, extended unemployment benefits, and money for roads, bridges and schools, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act—otherwise known as the Stimulus Bill or the Recovery Act—directed $150 billion in new funds to health care, of which $1.1 billion was to be used for comparative effectiveness research. Because such research isn’t much use if clinicians don’t know about it, part of that money is being used for dissemination of those results, including by a practice known as “academic detailing.”
Although the precise definition of comparative effectiveness research is a matter of some debate, as its name suggests it compares the efficacy, safety, ...
