More Than Half US Physicians Place Moderate-to-Severe Restrictions on Pharma Sales Reps

More than half of today's physicians place moderate-to-severe access restrictions on pharmaceutical sales reps, according to a report from ZS's AcessMonitor.

Overall access to physicians has declined steadily since the first AccessMonitor report in 2008. Today, 53 percent of physicians in the U.S. place moderate-to-severe restrictions on visits from sales reps – compared to last year's 49 percent. This marks the first time that the number of physicians who limit access has crossed the halfway point.

"Even traditionally rep-friendly physicians now limit sales rep access," said Pratap Khedkar, managing principal and leader of ZS's global pharmaceuticals practice. “Interestingly, oncology was considered rep-friendly in 2010 with 75 percent of oncologists labeled as ‘accessible.’ Now, the tables have turned: Seventy-three percent of oncologists are labeled as ‘access-restricted.’

AccessMonitor aggregates sales-call records from 70 percent of all U.S. pharmaceutical sales reps and examines how around 400,000 physicians and other prescribers meet with sales reps who visit their offices.

For more information on the report, visit http://bit.ly/ZS-AccessMonitor2015.