A different kind of conflict of interest
According to the Seattle Times, physicians are being wooed by Wall Street as well as pharma. While this probably won’t have much impact on CME, I find it an, um, interesting trend. A snip:
- About one in 10 American physicians have become paid consultants to Wall Street in the past few years, a practice that gives some investors an edge but can create legal and ethical problems for doctors, according to a study published yesterday in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
In the first academic study of its kind, written by Dr. Eric Topol of the Cleveland Clinic and Harvard professor Dr. David Blumenthal, the authors found about 75,000 expert clinicians and researchers now consult for hedge funds, stock analysts, venture capitalists or other sophisticated investors.
That’s up from 15,000 doctors who consulted in 2002, and fewer than 1,000 in 1996.
One more thing to ask during the disclosure process, I suppose.
