this is kind of interesting
Wednesday February 23 5:01 PM ET
Medical Journal Apologizes
By LINDA A. JOHNSON Associated Press Writer
In an extraordinary apology to readers, the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine admitted violating its
financial conflict-of-interest policy 19 times over the past three years in its selection of doctors to review new drug
treatments.
The Boston-based weekly journal, considered one of the world's premier medical publications, disclosed in
Thursday's issue that it let doctors who had financial ties to the drug makers write the articles.
''It was carelessness on our part,'' Dr. Marcia Angell, editor in chief since September, said in an interview.
The internal review was prompted by a news report about one such violation last fall. It found 18 additional
instances since January 1997.
The violations involve the journal's ''Drug Therapy'' feature, a series of reviews of the latest drug treatments for
particular illnesses. In each case, the journal failed to disqualify authors even though they had revealed their
financial ties up front, Angell said.
Angell said the journal solicits authors to write the reviews but is supposed to bar those have directly or indirectly
received ''major research support'' or payment as a consultant from companies that make drugs prominently
discussed in those articles.
The ''Drug Therapy'' series is overseen by an outside editor, Dr. Alistair J.J. Wood, a pharmacology professor at
Vanderbilt University.
Angell said Wood disqualified authors who personally received significant research funding from the maker of
drugs discussed prominently in an article, but failed to disqualify authors whose institutions received such grants
or authors who served as consultants to the drug companies. She said some in-house editors knew of the practice
and overlooked it.
She said she suspects there were violations before 1997, too, but the in-house review went back only three years.
Wood has been editing the series for about a decade.
In a letter to readers, Angell apologized for the lapse and said steps have been taken to ensure against any
recurrence. She said no action was taken against Wood. He and a deputy editor who helps edit the series also
signed the letter.
The letter listed the 18 newly uncovered articles along with the drug makers, which ranged from little-known
biotech companies to pharmaceutical giants like Bristol-Myers Squibb, Merck & Co., Pharmacia & Upjohn and
Wyeth-Ayerst.
The journal regularly publishes original, unsolicited articles on clinical trials of particular drugs written by
academic scientists who have received major research funding from a drug manufacturer involved. In those cases,
the article notes those funding sources at the end.
Angell said the stricter policy for review articles is difficult to maintain because ''there's so much connection
between academia and the private sector now.'' |
