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Back July 2009, Grassley asked eight medical journals to describe their policies and practices regarding ghostwriting. "Articles published in medical journals are widely read by practitioners and are relied upon as being objective and scientific in nature," he said in letters to the journals. "Concerns have been raised, however, that some medical literature may be little more than subtle advertisements rather than independent research."
On January 3, 2010, the New York Times ran the headline: "Harvard Teaching Hospitals Cap Outside Pay".
"Senior officials at the two hospitals, Massachusetts General and Brigham and Women's Hospitals in Boston, must limit their pay for serving as outside directors to what the policy calls "a level befitting an academic role" -- no more than $5,000 a day for actual work for the board," reporter Duff Wilson wrote.
"Some had been receiving more than $200,000 a year," he said. "Also, they may no longer accept stock. "
As an example, the Times noted that Dr Daniel Podolsky was the original chairman of the Partners policy commission in 2007, when "he was the chief academic officer at Partners and a $191,000-a-year board member at GlaxoSmithKline."
Partners HealthCare is also forbidding speaker's fees from drug companies for any employee, "including nearly 8,000 with Harvard faculty appointments," the Times reported.
Evelyn Pringle
(The Paxil Birth Defect Litigation Update Series is sponsored by the Houston law firm of Vickery, Waldner and Mallia at http://www.justiceseekers.com )
(Evelyn Pringle is an investigative Journalist and Researcher focused on exposing corruption in government and corporate America)
