# CMS Open Payments Scraper - Pharma & Device Payments (`groundplanes/cms-open-payments-search`) Actor Scrape CMS Open Payments (Sunshine Act) general, research, and ownership payments from pharmaceutical and medical device manufacturers to physicians and teaching hospitals. - **URL**: https://apify.com/groundplanes/cms-open-payments-search.md - **Developed by:** [Groundplane Labs](https://apify.com/groundplanes) (community) - **Security:** Limited permissions - **Stats:** 2 total users, 1 monthly users, 100.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks - **User rating**: No ratings yet ## Pricing from $2.10 / 1,000 payments This Actor is paid per event. You are not charged for the Apify platform usage, but only a fixed price for specific events. Since this Actor supports Apify Store discounts, the price gets lower the higher subscription plan you have. Learn more: https://docs.apify.com/actors/running/actors-in-store.md#pay-per-event ## What's an Apify Actor? An Actor is a serverless cloud program that runs on the Apify platform. It has two run modes. In Batch mode, an Actor accepts a well-defined JSON input, performs an action which can take anything from a few seconds to a few hours, and optionally produces a well-defined JSON output, datasets with results, or files in key-value store. In Standby mode, an Actor provides a web server which can be used as a website, API, or an MCP server. Apify vocabulary and the platform model are defined once, in the agent quickstart at https://apify.com/agents.md. ## How to integrate an Actor? If asked about integration, you help developers integrate Actors into their projects. You adapt to their stack and deliver integrations that are safe, well-documented, and production-ready. Do not guess an integration path. Every one of them is in the agent quickstart at https://apify.com/agents.md: the Apify MCP server, Agent Skills with the Apify CLI, the JavaScript and Python clients, the REST API, and the account-free path for an agent with no human to sign in. It also carries the rule on stating cost before the first paid run. For examples already wired to this Actor's own input schema, see the [API](#api) section below. Each client library has reference documentation the quickstart does not restate: [JavaScript/TypeScript](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs.md) (`npm install apify-client`) and [Python](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs.md) (`pip install apify-client`). # README ## CMS Open Payments Scraper - Pharma & Device Payments Scrape federal Sunshine Act **General**, **Research**, and **Physician Ownership** payment disclosures from pharmaceutical, biotech, and medical device manufacturers to physicians and teaching hospitals via the official Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Open Payments DKAN API. > **Disclaimer:** This Actor is an independent tool and is not affiliated with or endorsed by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) or the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). *** ### What it does - **Dynamic Dataset Resolution:** Resolves the official CMS DKAN dataset UUID at runtime from `https://openpaymentsdata.cms.gov/api/1/metastore/schemas/dataset/items` by program year and payment type (`General Payment Data`, `Research Payment Data`, or `Ownership Payment Data`), never hardcoded. - **Manufacturer, State, Nature & Amount Filtering:** Queries `POST https://openpaymentsdata.cms.gov/api/1/datastore/query//0` with server-side filters on `recipient_state` and the manufacturer name (and, for GENERAL with a single `natureOfPayment` term, a server-side LIKE on the nature column), plus client-side substring filtering on `natureOfPayment` and threshold filtering on `minAmountUsd`. Results are sorted newest first by the server (`date_of_payment` descending, or `payment_publication_date` for OWNERSHIP) before `maxItems` is applied. Within a single date, rows are ordered by amount descending; the date-level order is exact. - **OWNERSHIP field notes:** CMS Ownership datasets do not publish a form of payment, a product, or a payment date, so `formOfPayment`, `productCategory`, and `productName` are null for OWNERSHIP rows, `paymentDate` carries the CMS publication date, `dateBasis` is `"publicationDate"` for OWNERSHIP rows (it is `"paymentDate"` for GENERAL and RESEARCH rows), `amountUsd` carries `value_of_interest` (falling back to `total_amount_invested_usdollars`), and manufacturer matching uses the submitting manufacturer name (the applicable manufacturer name is also populated on ownership records and matches the submitting name on sampled rows; the submitting name is the match key for consistency across payment types). - **Unified Schema Across Payment Types:** Normalizes `GENERAL`, `RESEARCH`, and `OWNERSHIP` disclosures into a single 21-field output schema including `npi`, `firstName`, `lastName`, `specialty`, `teachingHospitalName`, `manufacturerName`, `amountUsd`, `paymentDate`, `dateBasis`, `natureOfPayment`, `formOfPayment`, `productCategory`, and `productName`. - **Newest-First Ordering:** Deduplicates by `recordId` and sorts results by `paymentDate` descending (then `amountUsd` descending) before applying `maxItems`. *** ### Who it's for - **Life Sciences Compliance & Legal Teams:** Audit Sunshine Act disclosures, consulting fee distributions, and KOL (Key Opinion Leader) relationships across therapeutic areas. - **Medical Device & Biotech Commercial Analysts:** Benchmark manufacturer spending, royalty/licensing arrangements, and clinical trial research payments by state and specialty. - **Healthcare Researchers & Journalists:** Analyze financial relationships between drug/device manufacturers, teaching hospitals, and healthcare providers using primary CMS disclosures. *** ### Input All parameters have working defaults/prefills that return results in under 2 minutes. | Field | Type | Default / Prefill | Description | |---|---|---|---| | `paymentType` | `string` | `"GENERAL"` | `GENERAL` (consulting, royalties, food/beverage, travel, speaking), `RESEARCH` (clinical trial & research grants), or `OWNERSHIP` (physician ownership & investment interests). | | `programYear` | `integer` | latest available | CMS Open Payments reporting program year (e.g. `2025`, `2024`, `2023`). Leave blank or omit it to use the latest available year, resolved dynamically from the CMS metastore at runtime. An explicit year works exactly as before. | | `manufacturerNames` | `array` | `["Stryker"]` | Case-insensitive substring match against the paying manufacturer or GPO name (e.g. `["Stryker"]`, `["Medtronic", "Pfizer"]`). Leave empty for all manufacturers. | | `natureOfPayment` | `array` | `[]` | Optional case-insensitive substring filters on `natureOfPayment` (e.g. `["Consulting", "Royalty"]`). Leave empty for all payment natures. For RESEARCH rows the filter also matches the synthesized nature text, which includes the study name (for example "Research: "), so a study-name substring can match RESEARCH rows. | | `recipientStates` | `array` | `["AZ"]` | Two-letter US state or territory codes for the recipient (e.g. `["AZ"]`, `["AZ", "NV"]`). Leave empty for all states. | | `minAmountUsd` | `number` | `0` | Minimum payment amount (or ownership value of interest) in USD. | | `maxItems` | `integer` | `200` | Maximum number of records to return. | #### Example input JSON ```json { "paymentType": "GENERAL", "programYear": 2025, "manufacturerNames": ["Stryker"], "natureOfPayment": [], "recipientStates": ["AZ"], "minAmountUsd": 0, "maxItems": 200 } ``` #### Example run options (with default $50 max charge protection) When invoking via the Apify API or CLI, set a default maximum charge of **$50** (`"maxTotalChargeUsd": 50`): ```json { "maxTotalChargeUsd": 50 } ``` The Actor checks `calculate_max_event_charge_count_within_limit("apify-default-dataset-item")` before every dataset push and stops cleanly when your spending limit is reached. *** ### Output Results are saved to the default dataset, deduplicated by `recordId`, and sorted by `paymentDate` descending. #### Output fields | Field | Type | Description | |---|---|---| | `recordId` | `string` | CMS Open Payments unique `record_id`. | | `programYear` | `integer` | Reporting program year (e.g. `2025`). | | `paymentType` | `string` | `GENERAL`, `RESEARCH`, or `OWNERSHIP`. | | `recipientType` | `string \| null` | Covered recipient classification (`Covered Recipient Physician`, `Covered Recipient Teaching Hospital`, etc.). | | `npi` | `string \| null` | 10-digit National Provider Identifier (NPI) of the recipient or principal investigator. | | `firstName` | `string \| null` | Recipient provider first name. | | `lastName` | `string \| null` | Recipient provider last name. | | `specialty` | `string \| null` | Provider taxonomy / specialty string. | | `teachingHospitalName` | `string \| null` | Teaching hospital name when applicable. | | `city` | `string \| null` | Recipient practice city. | | `state` | `string \| null` | Recipient 2-letter state code. | | `zip` | `string \| null` | Recipient postal ZIP code. | | `manufacturerName` | `string \| null` | Applicable manufacturer or GPO making the payment. | | `amountUsd` | `number \| null` | Total payment amount (or ownership value of interest) in USD. | | `paymentDate` | `string \| null` | Date of payment in `YYYY-MM-DD` format. For OWNERSHIP rows this is the CMS publication date; see `dateBasis`. | | `dateBasis` | `string` | What `paymentDate` represents: `"publicationDate"` for OWNERSHIP rows, `"paymentDate"` for GENERAL and RESEARCH rows. | | `natureOfPayment` | `string \| null` | Nature of payment or transfer of value (or study name / terms of interest). | | `formOfPayment` | `string \| null` | Form of payment or transfer of value (`Cash or cash equivalent`, `In-kind items and services`, etc.). | | `productCategory` | `string \| null` | Primary associated product category or therapeutic area. | | `productName` | `string \| null` | Primary associated drug, biological, device, or medical supply name. | | `sourceDatasetId` | `string` | Resolved CMS DKAN dataset UUID. | #### Sample output row (synthetic example) ```json { "recordId": "9900112233", "programYear": 2025, "paymentType": "GENERAL", "recipientType": "Covered Recipient Physician", "npi": "1000000000", "firstName": "ALEX", "lastName": "EXAMPLE", "specialty": "Allopathic & Osteopathic Physicians|Orthopaedic Surgery", "teachingHospitalName": null, "city": "PHOENIX", "state": "AZ", "zip": "85004", "manufacturerName": "Example Medical Devices Corp.", "amountUsd": 1250.0, "paymentDate": "2025-11-14", "dateBasis": "paymentDate", "natureOfPayment": "Consulting Fee", "formOfPayment": "Cash or cash equivalent", "productCategory": "Orthopaedics", "productName": "Example Ortho System", "sourceDatasetId": "fb0b1734-1410-429d-92f6-3f4b35218e5e" } ``` *** ### How pricing works Pay per result: $3 per 1,000 rows returned ($0.003 per row). You only pay for rows returned. *** ### Data source and terms - **Official Source:** Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS): [Open Payments Data Portal](https://openpaymentsdata.cms.gov/) - **Update Cadence:** CMS Open Payments data is published **annually** (each new program year is released on or around June 30 and refreshed in January for dispute resolutions and corrections). It is an annual statutory disclosure dataset, not a real-time feed. - **Terms of Use:** Published by CMS under the federal Physician Payments Sunshine Act (42 U.S.C. ยง 1320a-7h). See [CMS Open Payments About the Data & Methodology](https://www.cms.gov/priorities/key-initiatives/open-payments/data). *** ### Compliance CMS Open Payments disclosures (including provider names, NPIs, specialties, and practice cities/states) are published by CMS under the Physician Payments Sunshine Act for public transparency, academic research, and regulatory compliance. CMS does not publish email addresses or telephone numbers in Open Payments, and this Actor does not perform third-party contact enrichment. - **CMS Data-Use Notes:** Financial ties between healthcare providers and manufacturers do not by themselves indicate an improper relationship; consult the [CMS Open Payments methodology](https://www.cms.gov/priorities/key-initiatives/open-payments/data) when interpreting payment records. - **Outreach & Privacy Laws:** Buyers are solely responsible for complying with the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (**TCPA**), the **National Do-Not-Call (DNC) Registry**, the **CAN-SPAM Act**, and all applicable state and international privacy laws before conducting any outreach. - **No Consumer / Individual Targeting:** This tool is designed for healthcare compliance, transparency research, and B2B life sciences analysis, and must not be used for consumer targeting. *** ### Canary input A tiny self-test that returns rows in under 30 seconds: use the default input with `"maxItems": 5`. A healthy run ends with a status starting `Complete:` and 5 rows, newest first. ```json { "paymentType": "GENERAL", "programYear": 2025, "manufacturerNames": ["Stryker"], "natureOfPayment": [], "recipientStates": ["AZ"], "minAmountUsd": 0, "maxItems": 5 } ``` *** ### Troubleshooting - **Status starts with `PARTIAL:`:** the run finished but something material was withheld or went wrong mid-scan (for example a CMS source error after some rows were collected, or invalid rows skipped). The status message states the reason and the row counts. Report repeated PARTIAL runs on the actor's Issues tab. - **Zero matches:** a healthy run with no matching records ends `Complete: 0 rows matched your filters`, with the scanned count in the message. Widen `manufacturerNames`, add `recipientStates`, clear `natureOfPayment`, or lower `minAmountUsd`. - **Caps:** reaching `maxItems` is reported in the `Complete:` message. Reaching your max charge limit ends the run as `PARTIAL:` with the reason stated; raise the limit to get more rows. - **Stale data:** Open Payments is an annual dataset (new program year each June, refreshed in January). A run can never return payments newer than the latest published program year. Found a problem or need a field? Open an issue on the Issues tab; we respond quickly. *** ### Limits and FAQ - **What rate limit does the Actor use?** The Actor throttles requests to under 3 requests/second (`2.8 req/s`) with 6 tries per request (5 automatic retries) and jittered exponential backoff from 2 to 32 seconds, capped at 120 seconds and honoring Retry-After, to respect CMS Open Payments infrastructure. - **How long do broad queries take?** Leaving both `manufacturerNames` and `recipientStates` empty means all manufacturers and all states, as documented. That asks CMS to sort the full program-year table (about 15 million rows for GENERAL), so the first page alone can take well over a minute at the source. Expect a broad run to take several minutes (the run timeout is 900 seconds and the per-request read timeout is 120 seconds; broad queries are paged in small 25-row chunks because the full-table sort alone takes about two minutes at the source). Narrowing by manufacturer, state, or nature of payment is much faster: the default run typically finishes in seconds. - **Why does `OWNERSHIP` mode use publication date when `date_of_payment` is absent?** CMS Ownership & Investment datasets report annual ownership stakes (`value_of_interest` and `total_amount_invested_usdollars`) along with `payment_publication_date` rather than a single transaction date; the Actor normalizes `payment_publication_date` into `paymentDate`. *** ### Changelog #### v0.1.3 (2026-11-01) - Grok Red Team fix round. Medium: broad all-manufacturers plus all-states queries no longer die on the read timeout: the read timeout is 120 seconds, datastore pages after the first send `"count": false`, broad (unconditioned) queries page in 25-row chunks with the count off, a single GENERAL nature filter is also sent server-side, and the default run timeout is 900 seconds; the broad-query limitation and expected duration are documented in the FAQ. Medium: retry policy is now 6 tries with jittered backoff from 2 to 32 seconds, capped at 120 seconds, keeping Retry-After handling. Lows: an omitted `programYear` now defaults to the latest available year from the metastore instead of hardcoded 2025; source-caused hard-fail messages (the source API error and the 20 percent validation refusal) now carry the Issues CTA, while user-input errors and user-limit PARTIALs do not; OWNERSHIP rows carry `dateBasis: "publicationDate"` (other types carry `"paymentDate"`); the description and README intro start with "Scrape" and pricing states the per-1K figure; the final ordering is sorted client-side by the parsed payment date descending, so it no longer relies on the server text-column sort being single-year. #### v0.1.2 (2026-10-31) - Red Team fix round. High: `paymentDate` for GENERAL and RESEARCH no longer falls back to the publication date; a row with an absent or unparseable `date_of_payment` is now invalid and skipped (counted), never emitted with a publication date sorted as if it were a payment date. OWNERSHIP keeps the publication date by disclosure. Medium: the core-column sentinel now also covers the headline output columns (recipient type, names, specialty, city, zip, and, where the dataset carries them, form and product fields), so a rename there fails loudly instead of emitting silent nulls. Medium: the OWNERSHIP manufacturer note corrected (the applicable manufacturer name is populated and matches the submitting name on sampled rows). Lows: retry profile now honors Retry-After with jittered backoff; the within-date tiebreak (amount descending) and the RESEARCH study-name filter matching are documented; TEST_NOTES NPIs masked and its stale status quote bannered. #### v0.1.1 (2026-10-31) - Fixed newest-first ordering: sorting now happens server-side before paging, so the rows returned are the newest matches overall, not the newest of the first unordered page. - Honest status contract: successful runs end `Complete:` (zero matches included), source problems mid-scan end `PARTIAL:` with the reason, and the Issues-tab call to action appears only on source-caused PARTIALs. - Added a core-column sentinel and per-row validation before push; invalid rows are counted and disclosed. - OWNERSHIP fixes: manufacturer matching uses the submitting manufacturer name, sorting uses the publication date, and `formOfPayment` is null (CMS publishes no form of payment for ownership records) instead of carrying the interest-holder classification. - Store categories set to BUSINESS only; default run options now cap the max charge at $50. #### v0.1 (2026-10-31) - Initial release supporting CMS Open Payments `GENERAL`, `RESEARCH`, and `OWNERSHIP` datasets with dynamic DKAN metastore UUID resolution. # Actor input Schema ## `manufacturerNames` (type: `array`): Case-insensitive substring match against applicable_manufacturer_or_applicable_gpo_making_payment_name (e.g. \["Stryker"], \["Medtronic", "Pfizer"]). Leave empty to include all manufacturers. ## `maxItems` (type: `integer`): Maximum number of payment records to return, sorted newest first by paymentDate. ## `minAmountUsd` (type: `number`): Minimum payment or investment value in USD. Set to 0 to return all matching payments. ## `natureOfPayment` (type: `array`): Optional substring filters on nature_of_payment_or_transfer_of_value (e.g. \["Consulting Fee", "Royalty or License", "Compensation for services"]). Leave empty for all payment natures. ## `paymentType` (type: `string`): CMS Open Payments dataset type: GENERAL (general payments such as consulting, royalties, food/beverage, travel), RESEARCH (clinical trial and research grants), or OWNERSHIP (physician ownership/investment interests). ## `programYear` (type: `integer`): CMS Open Payments reporting program year (e.g. 2025, 2024, 2023). Leave blank or omit to use the latest available year, resolved dynamically from the CMS DKAN metastore at runtime. The dataset UUID is also resolved dynamically from the metastore. ## `recipientStates` (type: `array`): Two-letter US state or territory postal codes for the recipient physician or teaching hospital (e.g. \["AZ"] or \["AZ", "CA"]). Leave empty for all states. ## Actor input object example ```json { "manufacturerNames": [ "Stryker" ], "maxItems": 200, "minAmountUsd": 0, "natureOfPayment": [], "paymentType": "GENERAL", "recipientStates": [ "AZ" ] } ``` # Actor output Schema ## `results` (type: `string`): No description # API You can run this Actor programmatically using our API. Below are code examples in JavaScript, Python, and CLI, as well as the OpenAPI specification and MCP server setup. ## JavaScript example ```javascript import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client'; // Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token // Replace the '' with your token const client = new ApifyClient({ token: '', }); // Prepare Actor input const input = { "manufacturerNames": [ "Stryker" ], "maxItems": 200, "minAmountUsd": 0, "natureOfPayment": [], "paymentType": "GENERAL", "recipientStates": [ "AZ" ] }; // Run the Actor and wait for it to finish const run = await client.actor("groundplanes/cms-open-payments-search").call(input); // Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if any) console.log('Results from dataset'); console.log(`๐Ÿ’พ Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/${run.defaultDatasetId}`); const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems(); items.forEach((item) => { console.dir(item); }); // ๐Ÿ“š Want to learn more ๐Ÿ“–? Go to โ†’ https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs ``` ## Python example ```python from apify_client import ApifyClient # Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token # Replace '' with your token. client = ApifyClient("") # Prepare the Actor input run_input = { "manufacturerNames": ["Stryker"], "maxItems": 200, "minAmountUsd": 0, "natureOfPayment": [], "paymentType": "GENERAL", "recipientStates": ["AZ"], } # Run the Actor and wait for it to finish run = client.actor("groundplanes/cms-open-payments-search").call(run_input=run_input) # Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if there are any) print(f"๐Ÿ’พ Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/{run.default_dataset_id}") for item in client.dataset(run.default_dataset_id).iterate_items(): print(item) # ๐Ÿ“š Want to learn more ๐Ÿ“–? Go to โ†’ https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs/quick-start ``` ## CLI example ```bash echo '{ "manufacturerNames": [ "Stryker" ], "maxItems": 200, "minAmountUsd": 0, "natureOfPayment": [], "paymentType": "GENERAL", "recipientStates": [ "AZ" ] }' | apify call groundplanes/cms-open-payments-search --silent --output-dataset ``` ## MCP server setup ```json { "mcpServers": { "apify": { "type": "http", "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=fetch-actor-details,groundplanes/cms-open-payments-search" } } } ``` The hosted server signs you in with OAuth on first connect, so no API token belongs in this config. Clients without OAuth support can send an `Authorization: Bearer ` header instead, using a token from API & Integrations in Apify Console (https://console.apify.com/settings/integrations). ## OpenAPI specification Download the OpenAPI definition: https://api.apify.com/v2/actors/fYfkkVm39XnBn4iFf/builds/xfaD2eBg01i1cswmc/openapi.json