Comparative effectiveness and innovation

Toby Cosgrove, CEO of the Cleveland Clinic, worries that comparative effectiveness research will stifle medical innovation. I don't think that's likely.I'm quoted in the Cleveland Plain Dealer today disagreeing with Cosgrove. Here's what I said:

David E. Williams, a health-care business consultant and principal at MedPharma Partners in Boston, doesn't see comparative effectiveness slowing innovation either."I think there are always concerns about whether payment policies are going to retard medical innovation," Williams said. "But in practice, there's been a strong willingness on the part of government and private payers to pay for new treatments."We should embrace comparative-effectiveness research, Williams said."It will make it more likely that things that are truly innovative will make it to market and it will discourage things that are flashy and expensive but don't add much clinical value," he said.