Key opinion leaders: where they come from and how that affects the drugs you prescribe

Abstract

Key opinion leaders (KOLs), also known as thought leaders, are the experts in their field upon whom we depend for original research leading to disease understanding and new therapies. We rely on them to write the articles, author the textbooks, and give the presentations that we absorb to become better dermatologists. KOLs have become intimately entwined with the marketing of pharmaceuticals and medical devices, used not only to lend credibility to claims of efficacy and safety but also to promote anecdotal and off-label use of these medications to increase industry profits. Identification and marketing of the KOLs themselves is being done more and more often by KOL management companies who are hired by industry to turn those involved in medical education and research into efficient and productive members of the sales force.

Association between physician characteristics and payments from industry in 2015–2017: observational study

“…Our findings indicate that physicians with more years in practice received higher payments from industry, compared with less experienced physicians, which is consistent with the recent findings using the 2014–2016 Open Payments data 18. These findings may reflect the fact that industry is most interested in building relationships with physicians who are experts in their field given that such expertise and experience can be obtained over many years of work in research and/or clinical practice 37. Our finding that physicians who attended elite research medical schools on average, received higher industry payments than physicians who attended less prestigious research medical schools is also a new finding and may reflect these same tendencies.…”

Financial Payments by Orthopedic Device Makers to Orthopedic Surgeons

“…It is also important to consider precisely who these individuals are, given the prominent role of "thought leaders" in clinical practice, technology diffusion, and pharmaceutical and device marketing. [23][24][25][26][27][28][29] Although we found that a relatively small proportion of all licensed US orthopedic surgeons (4%) were listed as consultants, the possibility remains that this small group of orthopedic surgeons might have a disproportionate effect on national orthopedic practice through professional societies and instruction of orthopedic trainees.…”

Undue industry influences that distort healthcare research, strategy, expenditure and practice: a review

“…Nevertheless, there appears to be a gap between the intended purpose and practice as financial conflict of interests are severely under‐reported in drug trial meta‐analyses and panel guidelines [34] and practitioners very rarely discount for such conflicts when evaluating the evidence base . Besides clinical guidelines formation, narrative review and editorials by key opinion leaders also have a major impact on clinical practice decisions and the medical community in general .An example of the influence of the conflict of interests of key opinion leaders is that although evidence does not support that brand‐name drugs are superior to generic drugs , editorials often counsel against the interchangeability of generic drugs .…”