Police arrested Thursday a 47-year-old former chief physician of the National Cancer Center Hospital East near Tokyo for allegedly taking bribes in return for giving special treatment to a medical equipment maker.
The Metropolitan Police Department suspects that the doctor, Yusuke Hashimoto, a U.S. resident, favored the company Zeon Medical in the selection of medical products slated to be used in the Department of Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Oncology at the hospital in Kashiwa, Chiba Prefecture.
The MPD also arrested former president of the Tokyo-based Zeon Medical, Noboru Yanagida, 67, on suspicion of giving bribes to Hashimoto.
Hashimoto allegedly had the company pay ¥1.7 million into his bank account around May 2021 in exchange for ensuring that the department used more stents made by Zeon Medical than those made by rival companies. Stents are used to treat clogged bile ducts.
According to MPD sources, Hashimoto, an associate professor at the University of Florida, was in charge of selecting medical products to be used at the department as its head at the time.
Hashimoto concluded a contract with Zeon Medical to receive ¥10,000 per stent for cooperation in research into the usability of such products, but no such research was actually conducted, the sources said.
In fiscal 2020, Hashimoto used about 150 stents made by Zeon Medical, the sources added.
The hospital opened in July 1992 as a medical facility to provide advanced treatment created through the merger of two hospitals in Chiba. It has some 240 full-time doctors and 420 beds.
Zeon Medical, founded in May 1989, is a subsidiary of Zeon Corp., listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange's top-tier Prime section. The 200-strong subsidiary makes and sells medical products related to the circulatory and digestive systems.
According to a credit research agency, Zeon Medical's sales totaled ¥3.8 billion in the year that ended in March this year.