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One of drug marketers' key tools in targeting physicians for increased sales is doctors' prescribing history. Using that data, marketers can see who's prescribing the competition's products and tailor pitches to convert them; who isn't prescribing much of anything and try to change that; and who are big prescribers and reward them, cultivating even more business.
Research has shown that drug marketers are successful at influencing physicians' prescribing habits, for example, inducing prescriptions for expensive brand-name drugs when effective generics are available. As a result, some states are trying to curb marketers' effectiveness, including limiting access to physician prescribing history.
The First Circuit has already upheld one such law, from New Hampshire, and now is set to hear a case involving a similar law from Maine. If such laws are routinely upheld and spread across the land, drugmakers could see profits take a hit.
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