Disputes and removals

If a record here is wrong, there are two separate things to fix, and they go to two different places. Correcting the record itself is done at CMS. Removing this site's page from search engines is done by us.

1. Correct the record — CMS

We do not author, verify, edit or correct any payment record. Every figure on this site is reproduced from what a manufacturer reported to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services under the Open Payments program. A correction made here would not change the federal record, and would make the two disagree.

CMS runs a formal dispute process for covered recipients, with a review-and-correction period each year. Start at cms.gov/openpayments.

When CMS republishes the corrected data, our next import picks it up and this site changes with it.

2. Remove this page from search engines — us

Separately from the accuracy of the data, you can ask us to stop offering your profile page to search engines. We honour that for a verified subject of the record.

• Email [email protected] from an address we can tie to you, with the URL of the page.
• We will ask you to confirm identity — an NPI and a matching professional email is usually enough.
• Once verified, we mark the page noindex within five working days and submit it for removal.

What that does and does not do: the page stops appearing in search results. The underlying CMS data is public and stays public, and anyone with the direct link, or with the federal dataset, can still read it. We are not able to remove you from the federal record, and nobody who offers to do that for a fee is able to either.

What a payment record means

It is worth saying plainly, because most people who write to us are worried about this: a reported payment is not an allegation. Financial relationships between industry and medicine are legal, common, and frequently how research gets funded at all. A reported meal is a reported meal. This site publishes what was disclosed and draws no conclusion from it.

Reporting something else

If a page shows the wrong person's details against a name — profiles that share a name are the commonest cause — tell us which two records are being confused and we will look at how we are matching them. That is our bug, not a CMS dispute.