Melissa Phillips, MD
Surgery · Knoxville, TNNPI 1013120815
Payments from drug & device makers
What this record shows
The money is spread across several categories — education (54.8%), speaking fees and travel and lodging — rather than concentrated in one kind of arrangement. Intuitive Surgical accounts for 98.8% of it on its own, with 33 other manufacturers making up the rest. Reporting peaked in 2019 at $112,552 and has fallen 99.8% since, to $244 in 2025. Among surgery clinicians in TN with any reported payments, this total sits in the top 5% — high for the specialty, which is a reason to read the composition above rather than the number alone.
Across 285 payments — averaging $639.00 each. Meals, travel, consulting and speaking fees, gifts and royalties reported by drug and device makers.
- Intuitive Surgical$180K
- AbbVie$768
- Johnson & Johnson$187
- Davol Inc.$175
- Conmed Corporation$154
- Olympus America Inc.$97
- plus $885 from 28 others
What the payments were for
- Consulting fees$4900%
- Speaking & faculty fees$51,80028%
- Travel & lodging$18,10310%
- Food & beverage$11,8447%
- Education$99,85055%
- Gifts$290%
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Intuitive Surgical | 201 | $179,850 |
| AbbVie(2 entities) | 18 | $768 |
| Johnson & Johnson | 7 | $187 |
| Davol Inc. | 2 | $175 |
| Conmed Corporation | 3 | $154 |
| Olympus America Inc. | 6 | $97 |
| Daiichi Sankyo Inc. | 4 | $90 |
| Teleflex LLC | 2 | $81 |
| Novo Nordisk | 5 | $70 |
| Innovation Technologies Inc | 1 | $69 |
| Medtronic | 4 | $64 |
| Sanara Medtech Inc. | 5 | $55 |
| Merck | 3 | $54 |
| Lilly USA, LLC | 3 | $46 |
| TELA Bio, Inc. | 2 | $27 |
| W. L. Gore & Associates, Inc. | 1 | $27 |
| Baxter Healthcare | 1 | $25 |
| Takeda Pharmaceuticals U.S.A., Inc. | 1 | $23 |
| Innocoll Pharmaceuticals Limited | 1 | $22 |
| Vertex | 1 | $19 |
| Mallinckrodt Enterprises LLC | 1 | $19 |
| Acera Surgical, Inc. | 1 | $19 |
| Salix Pharmaceuticals, A Division Of Bausch Health US, LLC | 1 | $19 |
| Integra Lifesciences Corporation | 1 | $18 |
| Boston Scientific | 1 | $17 |
| Ipsen Biopharmaceuticals, Inc | 1 | $16 |
| Reprise Biomedical, Inc. | 1 | $15 |
| Covidien LP | 1 | $15 |
| Merit Medical Systems Inc | 1 | $14 |
| Coopersurgical, Inc. | 1 | $14 |
| Cook Medical LLC | 1 | $14 |
| Smith+Nephew | 1 | $14 |
| Kowa Pharmaceuticals America, Inc. | 1 | $13 |
| Phathom Pharmaceuticals, Inc. | 1 | $9 |
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.
- Da Vinci Surgical System$172,837
- DA VINCI SP$4,450
- STRATTICE$490
- Phasix Mesh$144
How this compares
$182,116 in reported general payments places this provider in the 95th percentile of 516 surgery providers in Tennessee.
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Tamoxifen Citrate | 11 | $294 |
| Ondansetron Hcl | 44 | $143 |
| Oxycodone-AcetaminophenOxycodone Hcl/Acetaminophen | 37 | $117 |
Paid to pharmacies, not to this prescriber.
Other surgery in Knoxville
- Michael AntipordaKnoxville$77K
- Nitin RangnekarKnoxville$35K
- Kaela BlakeKnoxville$32K
- Stephen BoyceKnoxville$30K
- Matthew ManciniKnoxville$29K
- Gregory ManciniKnoxville$29K
- Mariah BeasleyKnoxville$17K
- Heath BroussardJackson$688K
- Eric WallaceCookeville$529K
- John RobertsonJohnson City$432K
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.