Kenneth Ashton, MD
Thoracic Surgery (Cardiothoracic Vascular Surgery) · Chandler, AZNPI 1144214172
Payments from drug & device makers
Across 94 payments — averaging $69.97 each. Meals, travel, consulting and speaking fees, gifts and royalties reported by drug and device makers.
- Edwards Lifesciences$2K
- Medtronic$2K
- Abbott$1K
- Atricure, Inc.$710
- Abiomed$381
- Bolton Medical Inc$205
- plus $490 from 10 others
What the payments were for
- Food & beverage$6,577100%
Most of this is food and beverage — typically meals provided during product presentations at a clinic or hospital. Nationally that is the single largest category of reported payments by count.
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Edwards Lifesciences | 26 | $2,159 |
| Medtronic(2 entities) | 19 | $1,556 |
| Abbott | 12 | $1,076 |
| Atricure, Inc. | 11 | $710 |
| Abiomed | 6 | $381 |
| Bolton Medical Inc | 3 | $205 |
| Getinge USA Sales, LLC | 5 | $158 |
| Saranas, Inc. | 2 | $126 |
| Boehringer Ingelheim | 2 | $45 |
| ZOLL Services LLC (a/k/a ZOLL Lifecor Corp) | 2 | $39 |
| Smith+Nephew | 1 | $36 |
| Teleflex LLC | 1 | $27 |
| Grifols USA, LLC | 1 | $20 |
| Saphena Medical, Inc. | 1 | $16 |
| Johnson & Johnson | 1 | $14 |
| Lemaitre Vascular, Inc. | 1 | $10 |
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.
- INSPIRIS RESILIA aortic valve$644
- Edwards SAPIEN 3 Transcatheter Heart Valve$471
- EPI-SENSE GUIDED COAGULATION SYSTEM WITH VISITRAX$340
- Confirm Rx$322
- CoreValve Evolut$306
- HeartWare HVAD$272
- Impella$239
- COREVALVE EVOLUT R$239
- Trifecta GT Tissue Heart Valve$204
- CardioMEMS HF System$164
- CG Future$157
- 3F$152
- Avalus$151
- Grafts$150
- MITRIS RESILIA Mitral Valve$147
- THORATEC HEARTMATE 3 LVAS IMPLANT KIT$139
- Edwards SAPIEN 3 Ultra Transcatheter Heart Valve$138
- EPI-SENSE GUIDED COAGULATION SYS$130
How this compares
$6,577 in reported general payments places this provider in the 35th percentile of 100 thoracic surgery (cardiothoracic vascular surgery) providers in Arizona.
See all thoracic surgery (cardiothoracic vascular surgery) providers in Arizona →
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.
Other thoracic surgery (cardiothoracic vascular surgery) in Chandler
- Sarah CountsChandler$109K
- John TedescoChandler$13K
- Merick KirshnerPhoenix$863K
- Dawn JaroszewskiPhoenix$794K
- Brian DeguzmanScottsdale$630K
- Lishan AklogPhoenix$531K
- Chirag PatelScottsdale$293K
- Michael SmithPhoenix$225K
- Abdul Samad HashimiPhoenix$175K
- Hao FangPhoenix$171K
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.