Kurt Vonfricken, MD
Surgery · Buffalo, NYNPI 1851351746
Payments from drug & device makers
What this record shows
This record is dominated by food and beverage: $12,048 of the $16,277 with a category attached, or 74.0%. It is spread thinly across 43 manufacturers, the largest accounting for just 13.1%. 2025 is the largest year on record at $4,995, 4.8 times the $1,048 reported in 2019. Among surgery clinicians in NY with any reported payments, this total sits in the top 10% — high for the specialty, which is a reason to read the composition above rather than the number alone.
Across 366 payments — averaging $44.47 each. Meals, travel, consulting and speaking fees, gifts and royalties reported by drug and device makers.
- Angiodynamics, Inc.$2K
- Philips North America LLC$2K
- Medtronic$2K
- Edwards Lifesciences$2K
- Boston Scientific$2K
- Abiomed$1K
- plus $5K from 37 others
What the payments were for
- Travel & lodging$4,22826%
- Food & beverage$12,04874%
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.
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.
- Micra$1,272
- AngioVac$1,270
- (9124) LM Undivided$1,115
- Rapiblyk$1,085
- AlphaVac$697
- STERNALOCK BLU SYSTEM$311
- (9520) IGT Devices Undivided$293
- Impella$255
- LifeVest$233
- Lasers$194
- Barostim Neo System$140
- FIBRYGA$125
- GlideLight$105
How this compares
$16,277 in reported general payments places this provider in the 90th percentile of 1,596 surgery providers in New York.
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 surgery in Buffalo
- Cheguevara AfanehNew York$1.4M
- Flavio Malcher Martins de OliveiraNew York$695K
- Yuri NovitskyNew York$548K
- Rasa ZarnegarNew York$478K
- Tanuja DamaniNew York$459K
- Benjamin SadowitzSyracuse$419K
- Stephen GoldstoneNy$386K
- Rache SimmonsNew York$371K
- George DenotoManhasset$333K
- Marina KurianNew York$328K
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.