Walter Thomas, MD
Orthopaedic Surgery · San Diego, CANPI 1063404606
Payments from drug & device makers
Across 76 payments — averaging $154.65 each. Meals, travel, consulting and speaking fees, gifts and royalties reported by drug and device makers.
- Arthrex$9K
- Micromed Inc$1K
- Smith+Nephew$644
- Goode Surgical Inc$249
- Saxum Surgical, Inc.$208
- Linvatec Corporation$125
- plus $95 from 4 others
What the payments were for
- Speaking & faculty fees$2,00017%
- Travel & lodging$3,80032%
- Food & beverage$3,61131%
- Education$2,34220%
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 | 53 | $9,076 |
| Micromed Inc | 6 | $1,356 |
| Smith+Nephew | 10 | $644 |
| Goode Surgical Inc | 1 | $249 |
| Saxum Surgical, Inc. | 1 | $208 |
| Linvatec Corporation | 1 | $125 |
| Globus Medical | 1 | $32 |
| Sight Sciences, Inc. | 1 | $27 |
| Abbott | 1 | $22 |
| Boston Scientific | 1 | $15 |
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.
- Regeneten$384
- LINVATEC ARTHROSCOPY$125
- BioBrace 23mm$125
How this compares
$11,753 in reported general payments places this provider in the 70th percentile of 1,808 orthopaedic 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 |
|---|---|---|
| Ibuprofen | 25 | $228 |
| Oxycodone Hcl | 11 | $188 |
| Celecoxib | 15 | $92 |
| Gabapentin | 29 | $71 |
Paid to pharmacies, not to this prescriber.
Other orthopaedic surgery in San Diego
- Peter NewtonSan Diego$7M
- Joseph JankiewiczSan Diego$2.6M
- Mark McBrideSan Diego$2.6M
- Bradford HackArcadia$18.3M
- Robert GorabOrange$14.5M
- Kelly VinceLos Angeles$9.6M
- Stephen HowellSacramento$9.4M
- Thomas CoonRed Bluff$9.2M
- Nirav AminPlacentia$5.8M
- Tom NorrisSan Francisco$5.3M
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.