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How Not to Sell a Product to an Academic Physician
Today I sat in the infection control committee at Grady Memorial hospital and listened to two sales pitches for products meant to decrease surgical site infection. I am a tough sell at these meetings. Some might even say that I am the asshole in the room. But really the issue is that I say what everyone else is thinking but are too polite to say.
The first pitch was from Ethicon, who was marketing their antimicrobial impregnated suture. The presentation shows convincing evidence that the suture, placed in a petri dish surrounded by bacteria, does in fact inhibit bacterial growth. There were many claims made that it also decreased the rates of wound infections in comparison to using typical suture. When I questioned what data there were to suggest this, I was told that the data was all in my handouts.
I looked down at my handouts and found no data whatsoever. I found a bibliography of about thirty articles that investigated the product. I pointed out that there is no data, just a list of articles. I was reassured that these data support everything that they are saying.
At this point I was kind of pissed.
Academic OB/GYN 