Clay Nelson, MD
Orthopaedic Surgery · Rocky Mount, NCNPI 1154732295
Payments from drug & device makers
Across 52 payments — averaging $772.13 each. Meals, travel, consulting and speaking fees, gifts and royalties reported by drug and device makers.
- Arthrex$27K
- Smith+Nephew$8K
- ALON Medical Technology$4K
- Stryker$407
- Gentleman Orthopedic Solutions$343
- Southtech Orthopedics$209
- plus $245 from 5 others
What the payments were for
- Grants$20,00050%
- Travel & lodging$1,8135%
- Food & beverage$1,5054%
- Education$16,83342%
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Arthrex | 28 | $26,633 |
| Smith+Nephew | 3 | $8,226 |
| ALON Medical Technology | 3 | $4,088 |
| Stryker | 6 | $407 |
| Gentleman Orthopedic Solutions | 4 | $343 |
| Southtech Orthopedics | 1 | $209 |
| Tricoast Surgical Solutions LLC | 3 | $147 |
| Johnson & Johnson | 1 | $47 |
| Osteocentric Technologies, Inc. | 1 | $21 |
| Avanos Medical | 1 | $17 |
| Orthofix Medical, Inc. | 1 | $12 |
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.
How this compares
$40,151 in reported general payments places this provider in the 80th percentile of 845 orthopaedic surgery providers in North Carolina.
Medicare billing
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Prednisone | 97 | $519 |
| Meloxicam | 208 | $449 |
| Oxycodone-AcetaminophenOxycodone Hcl/Acetaminophen | 20 | $145 |
| Gabapentin | 15 | $133 |
| Ondansetron Hcl | 34 | $118 |
| Diclofenac Sodium | 18 | $113 |
| Oxycodone Hcl | 11 | $87 |
Paid to pharmacies, not to this prescriber.
Other orthopaedic surgery in Rocky Mount
- Thomas FehringCharlotte$18.3M
- Walter BeaverCharlotte$7.4M
- Robert AndersonCharlotte$6.6M
- William JiranekDurham$6.4M
- John MasonCharlotte$6.2M
- Thomas VailDurham$5.7M
- William DavisCharlotte$5.2M
- John EllingtonCharlotte$5.2M
- Mark EasleyDurham$4.2M
- Carroll JonesCharlotte$3.9M
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.