For years, critics have complained that doctors and the pharmaceutical industry have become too cozy, creating all sorts of unseemly conflicts of interest. That's led to a push for new rules to police these relationships and enforce greater transparency.
Now experts are debating whether these measures have gone too far. There's an interesting back-and-forth between doctors in the New England Journal of Medicine and the British Medical Journal on whether conflicts of interest are actually a huge problem in medicine — and whether efforts to regulate them do more harm than good.
There's no question that doctors and Big Pharma sometimes work closely together. Drug companies sponsor medical education programs. They send sales representatives to pitch doctors on new drugs and provide drug samples. They also fund plenty of medical research.
Critics worry that these interactions can bias how doctors treat patients or how they prescribe drugs. Big Pharma money can also distort research: industry-funded studies are four times more likely to lead to favorable and positive results for the products under study than independent research. Inappropriate Pharma influence can lead to waste in the health system or even avoidable patient harm and death. Full story...
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Now experts are debating whether these measures have gone too far. There's an interesting back-and-forth between doctors in the New England Journal of Medicine and the British Medical Journal on whether conflicts of interest are actually a huge problem in medicine — and whether efforts to regulate them do more harm than good.
There's no question that doctors and Big Pharma sometimes work closely together. Drug companies sponsor medical education programs. They send sales representatives to pitch doctors on new drugs and provide drug samples. They also fund plenty of medical research.
Critics worry that these interactions can bias how doctors treat patients or how they prescribe drugs. Big Pharma money can also distort research: industry-funded studies are four times more likely to lead to favorable and positive results for the products under study than independent research. Inappropriate Pharma influence can lead to waste in the health system or even avoidable patient harm and death. Full story...
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