Derek Taggard, MD
Neurological Surgery · Fresno, CANPI 1548242589
Payments from drug & device makers
What this record shows
The money is spread across several categories — royalties or licence payments (53.9%), consulting fees and travel and lodging — rather than concentrated in one kind of arrangement. Nexxt Spine LLC accounts for 60.3% of it on its own, with 9 other manufacturers making up the rest.
Across 93 payments — averaging $1009.58 each. Meals, travel, consulting and speaking fees, gifts and royalties reported by drug and device makers.
- Nexxt Spine LLC$57K
- Spineart USA Inc$31K
- Degen Medical, Inc.$5K
- Synthes GmbH$1K
- Spineart SA$229
- Ecential Robotics$182
- plus $141 from 4 others
Across 2 payments — averaging $18,535 each. Payments tied to a research study. These frequently flow through the physician to a hospital or research institution rather than to the physician personally.
- Vertex$24K
- Ossdsign USA Incorporated$13K
What the payments were for
- Royalty or licence$50,63654%
- Consulting fees$23,04625%
- Travel & lodging$13,60114%
- Food & beverage$6,6087%
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Nexxt Spine LLC | 15 | $56,596 |
| Spineart USA Inc | 62 | $30,724 |
| Degen Medical, Inc. | 3 | $4,964 |
| Synthes GmbH | 2 | $1,054 |
| Spineart SA | 3 | $229 |
| Ecential Robotics | 3 | $182 |
| Medtronic | 1 | $47 |
| Stryker | 2 | $45 |
| Johnson & Johnson | 1 | $31 |
| Abbott | 1 | $18 |
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.
- Saxxony System$33,334
- PERLA C$14,383
- Perla TL$3,052
- CURE ACP$2,000
- Nexxt Spine Product Portfolio$111
How this compares
$93,891 in reported general payments places this provider in the 85th percentile of 773 neurological surgery providers in California.
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Celecoxib | 35 | $1,804 |
| Hydrocodone-AcetaminophenHydrocodone/Acetaminophen | 19 | $198 |
| Methocarbamol | 15 | $178 |
Paid to pharmacies, not to this prescriber.
Other neurological surgery in Fresno
- Ian JohnsonFresno$1.3M
- Adam BrantFresno$1.2M
- Mark LevyFresno$451K
- Christopher AmesSan Francisco$7.1M
- Larry KhooLos Angeles$2.8M
- Samy AbdouSan Diego$2.4M
- Bret AbshireMurrieta$2.3M
- William TaylorSan Diego$2.1M
- Tooraj GravoriEncino$2M
- Ali MesiwalaRancho Cucamonga$1.5M
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.