Here’s an interesting editorial exploring the other side of conflicts of interest among researchers with ties to companies. A snip:

Over the past two decades, private biotechnology firms and other drug companies have increasingly played a major role in cutting-edge medical research. These companies have built relationships with many of the best and brightest academic scientists, helping to bring about huge advances in medical treatment, including powerful new hormones and anti-cancer drugs as well as new devices that repair heart damage.



But they have also drawn scrutiny from those who believe that, with so much money at stake, corruption must surely be present. Instead of assuming that scientists would want, above all, to protect their reputations and their research, critics have assumed the worst — and have underestimated the positive impact of relationships between university researchers and companies.

This is what kills me about my job—I was just laying out an article I wrote about state regulations related to pharma marketing for the July/August issue of Medical Meetings, and it was too long. Way too long. So I had to cut it in half. The good news, if you’re interested in what’s pending now, is that I put the extra half online here. I hope someone finds it and reads it—I’d hate to think all that work went for nothing! The rundown of what’s already on the books in five states and Washington, D.C., will be out when July/August comes online (though if anyone’s interested, I’d be glad to e-mail you a sneak peek).

You know all those cute direct-to-consumer ads (the toe fungus one makes my skin crawl every time I see it)? According to this article, docs are fighting back, saying that they don’t have enough time to “learn about the benefits and risks of a new drug before patients start requesting prescriptions.” The American Medical Association last month asked the FDA to put a moratorium on advertising new drugs to consumers until a certain time period has passed, which would probably help. As the article says,

“Doctors just want to make sure they have a chance to get up to speed on new drugs before the patients are being urged to seek these medications because of heavy advertising,” said Dr. Ron Davis, the association’s president-elect.

The American Medical Association is looking for a few good case studies to include in this year’s case-based session at the Annual Conference of the National Task Force on CME

Provider/ Industry Conference. This session is called “Working Together within the Guidelines:

Interactive Case Studies.”  From an AMA e-mail alert:

As in previous years, featured panelists in this session will represent the perspectives of the ACCME, AMA, FDA, PhRMA and OIG

and will address specific cases related to compliance, and will interact   with conference participants through the use of an audience response system.

 

In order to  develop the most current and relevant case studies, we would like to invite you to submit any challenges and/or interesting situations  that you have encountered as you navigate the guidelines and requirements in CME provider/industry collaboration.  If you are interested in submitting a case, or a situation that may be developed into a case,  please e-mail it to kevin.heffernan@ama-assn.org no later than July 31, 2006.

 

This year’s conference will be held October 16-18 in Baltimore.  To register, or obtain more information, click here.

From Anne Taylor-Vaisey:

This article was just published in the July-August 2006 issue of the JABFM: [free full text]

 

Hagen MD, Ivins DJ, Puffer JC, Rinaldo J, Roussel GH, Sumner W, Xu J. Maintenance of Certification for Family Physicians (MC-FP) Self Assessment Modules (SAMs): The first year. J Am Board Fam Med 2006;19:398-403.

 

Read more here

From Anne Taylor-Vaisey:

Here is a selection of Internet resources in three broad categories related to professional ethics. All are free online, but full text of retrieved resources usually requires subscriptions. For best searching results, read the search tips and use advanced search screens where available. (I always do this, but then I am a librarian and I can‘t help myself.)

 

Click here to read more.

The Jebel Ali Hospital in Dubai has launched the Matrix Medical Community Initiative, according to this article.

[It] will seek to impart continuous learning and foster an open dialogue on key issues by doctors within the UAE region.



Matrix MCI has already been hailed by Dubai’s healthcare practitioners as a novel concept and consists of three initiatives - Continuing Medical Education (CME), Community Doctor Network (CDN), and Networking Events (NE). Exclusively for the UAE-based doctors, Matrix Community Doctor Network (CDN) brings together doctors who are among the best in their medical specialty.

It’s an interesting concept. I’ll be curious to see if it takes off.