Has Christopher Towe, MD received payments from drug or device companies?

Yes. Drug and device makers reported $370,131 in general payments to Christopher Towe, MD across 610 transactions between 2019–2025. Most Open Payments records nationally are meals worth under $20; a reported payment is not evidence of wrongdoing.

Does a payment mean Christopher Towe, MD did something wrong?

No. Federal law requires drug and device makers to report almost every transfer of value to a physician, including a $14 sandwich at a lunch presentation. Consulting fees, research funding and royalties to device inventors are ordinary, legal parts of medicine. This site reports what was disclosed; it makes no allegation.

Where does this information about Christopher Towe, MD come from?

The U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. Payments come from Open Payments, published under the Physician Payments Sunshine Act. Billing and prescribing figures come from the Medicare Physician & Other Practitioners and Part D Prescriber public use files for 2024.

Christopher Towe, MD

Thoracic Surgery (Cardiothoracic Vascular Surgery) · Cleveland, OHNPI 1750529111

Payments from drug & device makers

$370,131in general payments, 2019–2025

Across 610 payments — averaging $606.77 each. Meals, travel, consulting and speaking fees, gifts and royalties reported by drug and device makers.

Zimmer Biomet$246K
Atricure, Inc.$107K
E.r. Squibb & Sons, L.L.C.$8K
Intuitive Surgical$2K
Medical Device Business Services, Inc.$1K
AstraZeneca$1K
plus $5K from 34 others

What the payments were for

Royalty or licence$61,99017%
Consulting fees$272,49874%
Travel & lodging$19,5635%
Food & beverage$12,8303%
Education$3,2501%

General payments by program year

Who reported the general payments

Companies are grouped under their corporate parent — a single manufacturer often files under several CMS reporting entities. Research and ownership payments are counted separately and are not in this table.

Company	Payments	Total
Zimmer Biomet	331	$245,975
Atricure, Inc.	150	$106,740
E.r. Squibb & Sons, L.L.C.	11	$7,857
Intuitive Surgical	12	$1,714
Medical Device Business Services, Inc.	8	$1,311
AstraZeneca	6	$1,283
Arthrex	9	$1,219
Johnson & Johnson(4 entities)	21	$850
Davol Inc.	7	$744
Rock Medical Orthopedics, Inc.	1	$458
Boston Scientific	4	$246
Procept Biorobotics Corporation	1	$204
Bard Access Systems, Inc.	2	$203
Integra Lifesciences Corporation	1	$165
Medtronic	2	$154
Baxter Healthcare	2	$136
Novartis	5	$88
Bard Peripheral Vascular, Inc.	2	$88
Merck	4	$76
Boehringer Ingelheim	4	$66
BD	3	$63
Incyte Corporation	3	$57
Regeneron Healthcare Solutions, Inc.	2	$53
Lilly USA, LLC	3	$49
Nexus Medical Technologies LLC	1	$46
Novo Nordisk	1	$34
G1 Therapeutics, Inc.	1	$24
Agios Pharmaceuticals, Inc.	1	$23
Pharmacosmos Therapeutics Inc.	1	$22
Amgen	1	$21
Actelion Pharmaceuticals US, Inc.	1	$18
Genentech USA, Inc.	1	$18
AVEO Pharmaceuticals, Inc.	1	$18
ZOLL Services LLC (a/k/a ZOLL Lifecor Corp)	1	$18
Blueprint Medicines Corporation	1	$17
Kls-martin L.p.	1	$16
Ipsen Biopharmaceuticals, Inc	1	$15
Seagen Inc.	1	$15
Sanofi	1	$14
Bayer	1	$13

What the payments were tied to

Products named in the reported payments. Only payments of $100 or more are attributed here — the typical reported payment nationally is a meal worth about $16, and listing those product-by-product would be noise.

RIBFIX TITAN$61,990
RibFix Advantage$60,054
ATRICURE CRYOICE CRYOSPHERE CRYOABLATION SYSTEM$59,761
RibFix Blu$58,998
RIBFIX BLU ADVANTAGE$35,477
ATRICURE CRYOICE CRYOABLATION SYSTEM (CRYO2)$14,787
ATRICURE CRYOSURGICAL SYSTEM$13,945
SYNERGY ABLATION SYSTEM$8,529
CMF & Thoracic-None$6,587
AdvantageRib$6,450
Da Vinci Surgical System$1,436
LINX Reflux Management System$1,112
TAGRISSO$1,074
Pectus Next Generation$968
EPI-SENSE GUIDED COAGULATION SYSTEM WITH VISITRAX$929
INTEGRA$494
SternaLock Blu$444
PROGEL$317
Progel Applicator Spray Tips$289
Echelon Flex$249

How this compares

$370,131 in reported general payments places this provider in the 90th percentile of 245 thoracic surgery (cardiothoracic vascular surgery) providers in Ohio.

See all thoracic surgery (cardiothoracic vascular surgery) providers in Ohio →

Medicare billing

Part B allowed, 2024

$116,468

Medicare patients

281

Services billed

530

What this is not: this is the amount Original Medicare Part B allowed for services this provider billed in 2024. It is not their income. It excludes Medicare Advantage — now more than half of all Medicare enrollment — along with Medicaid and all commercial insurance, and it is gross practice revenue before staff, rent, supplies and malpractice premiums. CMS also suppresses any figure covering ten or fewer patients, so low-volume providers appear smaller than they are.

Most prescribed under Part D

Drug	Claims	Cost to plans & patients
Gabapentin	13	$69
Oxycodone Hcl	14	$53

Paid to pharmacies, not to this prescriber.

Other thoracic surgery (cardiothoracic vascular surgery) in Cleveland

Edward SolteszCleveland$1.2M
Alan Marc GillinovCleveland$1M
Alejandro BribriescoCleveland$968K
Alan MarkowitzCleveland$951K
Eric RoselliCleveland$933K
Cristian BaezaCleveland$464K
Salil DeoCleveland$419K
Tomislav MihaljevicCleveland$387K
Zhen-Yu TongCleveland$269K
Patrick VargoCleveland$256K

See the full list for Ohio →

Where these figures come from

Payments: CMS Open Payments, program years 2019–2025 (publication P06302026_06032026).
Billing: Medicare Physician & Other Practitioners, data year 2024. Original Medicare Part B only.
Identity: NPPES NPI Registry, July 2026.

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