Truvada. Credit:Jeff Chiu A Sydney-based clinician topped the national rankings: Professor Andrew Carr, the director of the HIV, immunology and infectious diseases unit at St Vincent's Hospital. He received $39,549 from Gilead for attending educational meetings, advising and doing committee work. Working with pharmaceutical companies meant he could push them to develop safer and more potent HIV treatments and that he often spent time telling Gilead about the limitations of its medicines, Professor Carr told Fairfax Media when the report was released. "Without pharma, I would still have a ward full of dying patients." "My primary reason for doing any research is to improve patient health. Collaboration with drug companies in research allows my patients to access new treatments sooner, and allows me to learn how to use existing drugs better."

The third, fourth and fifth highest pharma-earners in NSW are all doctors at Holdsworth House medical practice in the Sydney CBD. The director of the practice, Associate Professor Mark Bloch, received $27,235 from Gilead. "The support from pharma to attend scientific meetings on behalf of colleagues was in accordance with Medicines Australia guidelines and the information obtained from these meetings was to enhance the care of patients in Australia with the most up-to-date scientific knowledge. Additionally, I share the knowledge gained with colleagues back in Australia," Associate Professor Bloch told Fairfax Media. Like other doctors on the national list, the pharma money supplemented Dr Bloch's income while he took time away from his practice. "Whilst away at scientific meetings I am not seeing patients and earn no income," he said.

Second place went to a St Vincent's doctor: cardiologist Associate Professor Cameron Holloway. The specialist regularly provides education sessions for medical practitioners and the general public which were sometimes sponsored by pharma companies, "though I have never given specific education about medications that the companies sell". "Given the education sessions are not focused on specific medications, I don't feel there is a conflict," he said. "Given the importance of transparency, I am pleased to outline that I have always disclosed pharmaceutical funding sources, though I understand the vast majority of doctors do not." Five of the 20 largest single payments were made to NSW practitioners. St George Hospital breast and endocrine surgical fellow Dr Susannah Graham received the single largest payment recorded: $15,847, from Sanofi for air travel and accommodation.

The financial support allowed her to attend an endocrine surgery conference in Baltimore in the US in April, Dr Graham said. "This meeting is one of the most highly regarded endocrine surgical meetings in the world and provided me the opportunity to further my knowledge and understanding of endocrine surgery and endocrine surgical problems," she said. "Upon returning to Australia, I presented a summary of my experience and discussed new techniques and research to a journal club, which included clinicians from interstate." Dr Graham was happy for Sanofi to disclose the information: "I believe transparency is important," she said.

Fairfax Media is not suggesting any of these doctors have behaved unethically or engaged in impropriety. The data was released as part of new transparency measures in Medicines Australia's latest Code of Conduct and is the first time individual payments, health professionals' names and locations have been reported in addition to overall figures. Only two-thirds of all doctors who received payments gave permission to have the details made public. But expect to see far more names in the next data drop once new transparency measure become mandatory from October. Gilead - which manufactures a range of drugs including the HIV pre-exposure prophylactic Truvada and the federal government-stockpiled flu vaccine Tamiflu - was the biggest spender in NSW, doling out nearly $324,000 to just 64 practitioners, an average of $5060.

Biogen - focused on treatments for neurological and autoimmune disease including multiple sclerosis - was a close second in terms of spend-per-doctor, shelling out $5050 per NSW practitioner. BMS was a close second in total spend, handing out $310,000 to 163 practitioners. Servier and Novartis spread their wealth furthest. Nearly 350 NSW practitioners received payments from Servier. About 310 received payments from Novartis. The transparency measure was adopted after talks with the Australian Medical Association and other health groups and the ACCC on the new code earlier this year. Payments recorded on Medicines Australia's records show that, combined, all drug company members paid "health care professionals" about $64 million - both in direct payments and support for travel and accommodation - over the 12 months to April this year.

Only six months of the data included health professionals' names. A Medicines Australia spokesman said in a statement the latest reports provided "clear information about payments for a doctor sharing their expertise and knowledge with pharmaceutical companies or leading medical education for other healthcare professionals". Loading "Ongoing education helps healthcare professionals to acquire the appropriate understanding and knowledge of these therapies," the statement said.