The physician's commitment to altruism, which puts the patients' interests first and is associated with scientific integrity and the absence of bias when making medical decisions, has traditionally constituted the cornerstone of medical ethics. In recent years, however, a flurry of federal prosecutions, class action lawsuits, and congressional investigations have underlined an increasing collusion between physicians and pharmaceutical and device manufacturers. When profit-seeking behavior overshadows concern for the patients' welfare, major conflicts ensue. In such cases, a conflict of interest may be defined as a set of conditions in which professional medical judgment concerning patients' welfare or the validity of research is unduly influenced by secondary interests. These can be financial, such as competition for research funding, or professional, such as professional retribution. Public anxiety about the interaction between physicians and the health industry has grown as a result of observing the increasing influence of money on the quality of patient care and the research process. The health industry has contributed to the discovery, development, and distribution of new drugs and devices that benefited patients. One offshoot of these activities has been the industry's commitment to medical education. However, the health industry's responsibility is ultimately to shareholders, who expect good financial returns on their investment. There is, obviously, a possibility for conflict between the positive and necessary help that the health industry provides to physicians in their educational and research activities and the requirement for that same industry to produce profits and create profit incentives. The very mechanism for profit incentives may be detrimental to patient welfare and may hamper the physician's ability to keep patients' interests as the primary priority. Americans spend about 200 billion dollars each year on prescription drugs. The industry spends 19 billion dollars per year on physician promotion of industrial products. Additionally, direct marketing to …