(Updated) The American Heart Association has announced that it has launched a $30 million venture capital fund “designed to spur healthcare innovation in heart disease and stroke care.” The AHA said that the Cardeation Capital fund will be funded by the AHA and co-investors Philips and UPMC. The fund “will invest in emerging healthcare companies that can…
Device Companies Fund Courses For Doctors In Training
February 27, 2018 by 1 Comment
At a crucial early stage of their careers young interventional cardiologists attend brief training courses that are considered essential for their careers. It is not generally appreciated that large device and drug companies provide the money that enable these young doctors to attend these meetings. The money from industry covers the cost of travel, hotel, meals,…
Ms. Inappropriate Defends The Status Quo
December 18, 2017 by 11 Comments
I think I would have liked the younger Lisa Rosenbaum, the cardiologist who last week in the New England Journal of Medicine launched a missile at the “less is more” movement. Here’s how her piece begins: They called me Ms. Appropriate. When I was a cardiology fellow, health care costs were skyrocketing, and I considered devoting…
Controversial Pharma CEO To Chair AHA Charity Ball
March 24, 2017 by 5 Comments
–The Wizard of Oz-themed ball seeks to raise $2 million on the yellow brick road. The American Heart Association’s annual Heart & Stroke Ball will be chaired by John Thero, the CEO of Amarin Corporation, the controversial pharmaceutical company. Amarin manufactures the prescription fish oil product Vascepa for which it is aggressively seeking an expanded indication…
Long Unsuccessful Heart Failure Drug Once Again At Center Of Controversy
January 23, 2017 by 9 Comments
–The long, strange 30-year journey of BiDil. It’s been buried in the avalanche of related news but there’s an interesting and somewhat bizarre cardiology angle to the debate over Trump’s nomination of Tom Price to be the next HHS Secretary. ProPublica reported on Friday that last summer Price went to bat for the makers of…
Dollars For Heart Docs: 2015 Edition
August 24, 2016 by 1 Comment
–Cardiologists received more than $200 million from industry in 2015. In 2015 cardiologists and other cardiovascular specialists received more than $200 million dollars from industry, according to new data released by Medicare. More than 30,000 physicians in cardiovascular medicine received industry payments in 2015, though many of these payments were relatively small amounts. But more…
Unforced Error: Pharma Supporter Attacks The Wrong Paper
June 24, 2016 by 6 Comments
If you’re going to attack a position you don’t like and also attempt to claim the moral and intellectual high ground it’s a good idea to get your basic facts rights. Even more– and it’s so obvious it shouldn’t need to be said– if it’s a scientific paper you are attacking you need to make sure you’re…
The Hidden Cost Of Free Lunch
June 20, 2016 by 2 Comments
–Brand name prescribing increases when industry pays for the meals Physicians who accept free meals from a drug company are more likely to prescribe that company’s brand name drugs, according to a new study in JAMA Internal Medicine. The authors compared data from the Open Payments Database listing industry payments to physicians with Medicare prescribing…
Increasing Support For Generic Drugs And Therapeutic Substitution
May 9, 2016 by Leave a Comment
–But some physicians, perhaps influenced by industry, remain skeptical. Generic drugs and therapeutic substitution (replacing a drug without a generic equivalent with a different but closely related drug in the same general class) are two key ingredients in most recipes to hold down health care costs. Now a package of articles and commentary in JAMA…
Prominent European Cardiologists Decry Curbs On Industry Support For Docs Attending Medical Meetings
December 3, 2015 by 2 Comments
(Updated) Starting in 2018 European device companies will no longer be allowed to directly sponsor physician attendance at medical meetings. In response, three prominent European interventional cardiologists warn that the change could have dire consequences, stifling education and potentially reducing attendance at European medical meetings by 30-50%. In the US physicians can still enjoy free meals….
Double Duty: Academic Leaders, Corporate Boards, And The Harvard Connection
September 29, 2015 by 3 Comments
A large and potentially disturbing number of leading academic figures serve on the board of directors of public healthcare companies, according to a new study published in BMJ. “These kind of industry relationships have not been front and center in most debates about conflict of interest (COI),” David Rothman, PhD, a medical historian at Columbia University, noted in…
A Coke, A Smile, And 120 Million Dollars
September 24, 2015 by Leave a Comment
As I’ve reported in the past Coca-Cola has a long history of giving money to medical organizations and researchers. Now we know just how much. In response to a New York Times story this summer, Coke has disclosed details of its financial support to a great number and broad variety of health organizations and initiatives. Over the past five years, it…
Labor Union Targets American Heart Association For Financial Conflicts
August 26, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Unite Here, a labor union with 270,000 members, is attacking a surprising target, the American Heart Association. A report released by the group— entitled “Is the American Heart Association for sale?”– cites multiple examples of financial conflicts of interest involving prominent leaders of the organization. Among the major accusations in the report: Robert Eckel, a former AHA president…
Cookie Monster, Free Lunch, And The New England Journal Of Medicine
August 20, 2015 by Leave a Comment
In its efforts to defuse the conflict of interest issue the New England Journal of Medicine keeps setting off new explosions. The recent series of articles by Lisa Rosenbaum in the New England Journal of Medicine about conflict of interest issues provoked a storm of debate, including a powerful response from three former NEJM editors (and my own more eccentric response). Now NEJM itself has published…
Can You Test A Drug And Also Say Negative Things About It?
June 15, 2015 by 8 Comments
In my last post I raised the possibility that Steve Nissen, a highly influential cardiologist who has been an outspoken critic of industry influence in medicine, might have his own conflict of interest (COI) problem. In response, another cardiologist, James Stein, said that my post was unfair in its treatment of Nissen and failed to…
Steven Nissen, Conflicts Of Interest, And The New Cholesterol Drugs
June 12, 2015 by 6 Comments
(Updated) Does Steve Nissen, an outspoken critic of inappropriate industry influence in medicine, have his own conflict of interest problem? This week Nissen, the chief of cardiology at the Cleveland Clinic, was widely quoted in news reports about the FDA advisory panels evaluating two new highly promising cholesterol drugs from Amgen and Sanofi/Regeneron. Nissen was broadly supportive of the drugs….
Our Limitless Capacity For Self-Deception
May 12, 2013 by 10 Comments
I want to share with my readers a recent post and accompanying comment published on CardioExchange. The original post is by Eric Lindley, a cardiology fellow at the University of Utah: Journal X: Not so Subtle Marketing Messages I was the rare resident who thought that conflict of interest issues in medicine were a bit overblown. I…
‘Bias in choosing the question is a much bigger issue than lying about the data’
February 13, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Robert Califf takes questions about conflict of interest from Harlan Krumholz. Here are a few choice quotes. Read the entire Q&A on CardioExchange. …focusing exclusively on the medical products industry and failing to consider other sources of conflict of interest is a huge mistake and leads to sensationalism that then engenders reactive rules that add to bureaucracy…
Guest Post: Why Is The National Library Of Medicine Still Indexing Reviews In Cardiovascular Medicine?
August 17, 2012 by Leave a Comment
The following guest post by Kevin Lomangino was originally published on HealthNewsReview.org. Lomangino is an independent medical journalist and editor who is currently Editor-in-Chief of Clinical Nutrition Insight, a monthly evidence-based newsletter which reviews the scientific literature on nutrition for physicians and dietitians. He tweets as@Klomangino. Why Is the National Library of Medicine Still Indexing Reviews in Cardiovascular…
Industry PR Efforts Influence Debate On Cholesterol Screening Guidelines For Children
August 3, 2012 by 4 Comments
Note: This post is accompanied by a separate guest post by James Stein. What role should industry play in discussions about guidelines, especially when the debate about those guidelines includes allegations that industry may have influenced the final product of the guidelines? Should a public relations agency that represents a company with a product that…
Guest Post– Universal Screening for Dyslipidemia In Children: A Debate With Equipoise, But Tarnished By Industry Influence
August 3, 2012 by 2 Comments
Editor’s Note: CardioBrief is pleased to publish this guest post written by James Stein, a professor of medicine at the University of Wisconsin and the director of preventive cardiology at the University of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinics. This post is accompanied by a separate post by Larry Husten. Universal Screening for Dyslipidemia in Children: A Debate with…
Industry Supported Editorial Assistance: The Debate Continues
February 16, 2012 by 3 Comments
Editor’s Note: Here is the latest installment of a debate over industry-sponsored editorial assistance between Tom Yates, a UK-based physician critical of the role of industry in medical publishing, and Karen Wooley, who owns a medical education company and is a representative of the the Global Alliance of Publication Professionals (GAPP). (The previous installments of the…
A Defense of Professional Medical Writers
February 14, 2012 by 2 Comments
Updated on February 16 with a response by Tom Yates to Karen Woolley. Editor’s Note: In response to a recent guest post by Tom Yates on industry sponsored editorial assistance, the following comment was submitted by Karen Woolley on behalf of the Global Alliance of Publication Professionals. This thoughtful statement deserves attention, but I would point out…
Guest Post: Industry Sponsored Editorial Assistance
February 12, 2012 by 4 Comments
Editor’s Note: The following guest post by Tom Yates is reprinted with permission from his blog Sick Populations. Yates is a UK-based physician with an interest in epidemiology and population health. Industry Sponsored Editorial Assistance by Tom Yates The September 2011 edition of the Quarterly Journal of Medicine contained two review articles which dealt with the use…
Part 1: The National Lipid Association and the FH Guidelines
May 17, 2011 by 7 Comments
Editor’s Note: This is the first of a three-part series on the National Lipid Association. This first part focuses on the NLA’s publication of a series of papers offering expert guidance on familial hypercholesterolemia (FH) and raises serious questions about the role of industry in the documents. The second part explores additional questions about the…
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