Walter Wakwe, MD
Thoracic Surgery (Cardiothoracic Vascular Surgery) · Sun City, AZNPI 1881910115
Payments from drug & device makers
What this record shows
This record is dominated by education: $14,000 of the $23,095 with a category attached, or 60.6%. Intuitive Surgical accounts for 88.4% of it on its own, with 10 other manufacturers making up the rest. 2025 is the largest year on record at $11,264, 2.5 times the $4,533 reported in 2019.
Across 84 payments — averaging $274.94 each. Meals, travel, consulting and speaking fees, gifts and royalties reported by drug and device makers.
- Intuitive Surgical$20K
- Zimmer Biomet$906
- Atricure, Inc.$593
- Davol Inc.$474
- Medtronic$153
- Pulmonx Corporation$150
- plus $397 from 5 others
What the payments were for
- Travel & lodging$3,93117%
- Food & beverage$5,16422%
- Education$14,00061%
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 | 60 | $20,422 |
| Zimmer Biomet | 4 | $906 |
| Atricure, Inc. | 5 | $593 |
| Davol Inc. | 7 | $474 |
| Medtronic | 2 | $153 |
| Pulmonx Corporation | 1 | $150 |
| Caris MPI, Inc. | 1 | $140 |
| AstraZeneca | 1 | $117 |
| Merit Medical Systems Inc | 1 | $80 |
| Abiomed | 1 | $38 |
| Stryker | 1 | $22 |
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.
How this compares
$23,095 in reported general payments places this provider in the 75th 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.
Most prescribed under Part D
| Drug | Claims | Cost to plans & patients |
|---|---|---|
| Pantoprazole Sodium | 13 | $90 |
Paid to pharmacies, not to this prescriber.
Other thoracic surgery (cardiothoracic vascular surgery) in Sun City
- Murali MacherlaSun City$20K
- John BreardSun City$14K
- Brett BroussardSun City$10K
- Dawn JaroszewskiPhoenix$794K
- Brian DeguzmanScottsdale$630K
- Lishan AklogPhoenix$531K
- Chirag PatelScottsdale$293K
- Abdul Samad HashimiPhoenix$175K
- Hao FangPhoenix$171K
- Roberto CerveraLake Havasu City$153K
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.