open_payments_search
Search CMS Open Payments general payments (Sunshine Act) -- pharmaceutical/device company payments to doctors and teaching hospitals. Filter by company, doctor surname, state, specialty, and year. Returns payment amount, type (food/travel/consulting/gift/royalty), drug/device name, and recipient ...
This record as markdown: /tools/io-github-blackboxfoundry-livedatalink/open-payments-search.md
What open_payments_search does on Livedatalink
AI agents call open_payments_search to retrieve information from Livedatalink without modifying anything. It is typically the context-gathering step in research, monitoring, and reporting workflows, before the agent takes action elsewhere.
| Parameter | Type | Required | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
year | string | — | Program year (auto-discovers latest if omitted, e.g. '2024') |
limit | number | — | Max rows (default 20, max 100) |
state | string | — | Two-letter state code (e.g. 'CA', 'TX') |
doctor | string | — | Doctor last name (case-insensitive) |
company | string | — | Manufacturer/GPO name (partial match), e.g. 'Pfizer', 'Stryker', 'Johnson & Johnson' |
specialty | string | — | Medical specialty (partial), e.g. 'Cardiology', 'Orthopaedic' |
Parameters from the server's own tool schema.
Why open_payments_search is rated Low
This tool queries a public government dataset (CMS Open Payments/Sunshine Act) and retrieves records. It only reads and returns existing data with no side effects, modifications, or destructive actions possible.
From the tool's definition Search CMS Open Payments general payments... Returns payment amount, type, drug/device name, and recipient details. 15M+ records per year.
Attacks that exploit this kind of access
The rule that runs open_payments_search safely
PolicyLayer is an MCP gateway: it sits between your AI agents and Livedatalink, and checks every tool call against a rule you set before the call runs. Nothing changes on the server itself. For open_payments_search, this is the rule to start with:
open_payments_search is read-only, so it stays allowed. Everything else on the server is denied unless you say otherwise.
The button opens the PolicyLayer dashboard: create your workspace, connect Livedatalink, apply this rule, and every open_payments_search call is checked against it from then on.
Questions about open_payments_search
Search CMS Open Payments general payments (Sunshine Act) -- pharmaceutical/device company payments to doctors and teaching hospitals. Filter by company, doctor surname, state, specialty, and year. Returns payment amount, type (food/travel/consulting/gift/royalty), drug/device name, and recipient details. 15M+ records per year. It is categorised as a Read tool in the Livedatalink MCP Server, which means it retrieves data without modifying state.
open_payments_search accepts 6 parameters: year, limit, state, doctor, company, specialty. The full parameter table on this page comes from the server's own tool schema.
Register the Livedatalink MCP server in PolicyLayer and add a rule for open_payments_search: allow, deny, rate-limit, or require approval. Point your MCP client at the PolicyLayer proxy URL and the rule is enforced on every call, before it reaches Livedatalink. Nothing to install.
open_payments_search is a Read tool with low risk. Read-only tools are generally safe to allow by default.
Yes. Add a rate_limit block to the open_payments_search rule in your PolicyLayer policy. For example, setting max: 10 and window: 60 limits the tool to 10 calls per minute. Rate limits are tracked per agent session and reset automatically.
Set action: deny in the PolicyLayer policy for open_payments_search. The AI agent will receive a policy violation error and cannot call the tool. You can also include a reason field to explain why the tool is blocked.
open_payments_search is provided by the Livedatalink MCP server (https://livedatalink.ai/mcp). PolicyLayer sits as a proxy in front of this server to enforce policies before tool calls reach the server.
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