This week’s Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) published a lengthy conflict of interest correction by Eugene Braunwald, editor of one of our iconic textbooks of cardiology and author of over 1000 peer-reviewed cardiovascular publications:
To the Editor: It has been brought to my attention that there were differences in my financial disclosures in a number of articles recently published in JAMA, and this warrants explanation.
Dr. Braunwald explains the various relationships inherent to discussing virtually any drug in our cardiovascular armamentarium. I encourage you to read the full text.
In reply to the correction, JAMA itself realizes it, too, has erred:
We appreciate Dr Braunwald providing his professional and transparent explanation to clarify the differences in the reported financial disclosures among several of his recent publications in JAMA. We fully recognize that determining relevant financial relationships involves judgment and that reporting of financial disclosure information certainly is not an exact science. In fact, in one of the Commentaries(1) that Dr Braunwald mentions, his co-author, Dr Gheorghiade, had reported to JAMA that he had received consulting fees from Bayer, Novartis, Sigma Tau, Johnson & Johnson, Takeda, Otsuka, and Medtronic. However, these disclosures inadvertently were omitted from the published article. The editors apologize for this oversight and regret this error.
With the depth and breadth of pharmaceutical and medical device company funding of academe, journals, and doctors is so pervasive and the disclosures so inclusive, what are readers to think?
In my view, these doctor-pharma relationships are part of the reason there have been the many advances we have enjoyed in medicine. Without these dollars to academics and their programs, there would be no research programs and little to no innovation. There simply is not enough dollars to support the costs of doing the work from independent sources, especially in today’s highly regulated research environment. Companies vested in bringing a new drug to market MUST do clinical trials to prove their safety and efficacy before their drugs are sold in the US. So companies bring their trials to well-respected doctors who see the proper patients. In turn, these doctors present the protocols to their Institutional Review Boards, process the reams of paperwork, ultimately decide which patient(s) might be appropriate candidates for the new medication, prescribe the drug, watch (and record) it’s side effects and benefits, treat complications (if they occur), collect and analyze the data (often with research technicians and nurses who help with blood tests and data collection), and publish the papers with the results. And yes, they collect a paycheck each month.
It’s what MUST happen to approve ANY drug.
So why all the fuss about a prominent academic cardiologist updating his conflicts in this "gotcha" moment of revelation?
I think in part it’s because our drugs (and health care in general) has gotten so expensive. Seriously, if innovative chemotherapeutic drug regimens weren’t going into the tens of thousands of dollars (in some cases), we (as the consumers of these drugs) probably wouldn’t care. But when we see the costs of these new drugs impact to our health insurance premiums and wallets directly, we look for people to blame.
And doctors, the intermediaries between the pharmaceutical companies and patients, are the easy target, especially when so many research doctors later morph into highly-paid marketing spokespersons once the research drug is approved for sale.
Doctors are starting to understand this. But like "The Boy Who Cried Wolf," we now see doctors disclosing everything to everybody so often that few are listening anymore. Disclosure slides are lucky to last a tenth of a second before a talk and most doctors don’t mind.
That’s because doctors know these "conflicts" inherent to our research process have not changed, because any research takes money – TONS of money. But now, instead of money being given to the doctor and his research program, it goes to "independent" research "institutes" or "foundations" designed to mix their donations with funds from private philanthropic support so the same dollar support is harder to track and gains favor with government regulators. All perfectly legal. All much more expensive. Yet most of it the same.
That’s because, believe it or not, when it works, sometimes the collaboration between doctor-researcher and industry can actually become a net positive for all of us.
-Wes
h/t Retraction Watch
