Industry

Paul Thacker and Charles Seife provide an update on the ongoing battles over transparency in science, writing for the PLOS Biologue blog. While transparency is important for accountability and the public trust, some have begun to argue that requests for personal communications between companies and researchers have gone too far.

A study in PLoS One shows that the number of National Heart Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) funded drug trials reporting positive results declined precipitously after the implementation of the clinicaltrials.gov registry, which requires researchers to record their trial methods and outcome measures before collecting data. Of the 55 studies examined, 57% percent of those published before the implementation of clinicaltrials.gov in 2000 yielded a positive result. After 2000, only eight percent of trials claimed a significant benefit to the intervention examined.

Robert Whitaker and Lisa Cosgrove discuss their new book Psychiatry Under the Influence in an interview with psychologist and social critic Bruce Levine for Truthout. In the book, Whitaker and Cosgrove apply the institutional corruption framework, developed by Larry Lessig, to psychiatry and determine that “just as elected officials develop dependency on special interests and become beholden to these funders instead of the citizenry,” psychiatry has “had its social mission subverted by drug companies as well as by the psychiatry guild's self-preservation and expansionism needs.”

Bloomberg reports that, "Adults in the U.S. have overtaken children in taking medication for the condition and accounted for 53 percent of the industrywide...

-A US Congressional Research Service report reviews various sources of information on how many different types of mental health workers there are and how much money they earn.

Randomized controlled trials published in four leading behavioral health journals show that new requirements for registering of trials does not seem to be improving trial design or transparency.

-Three former editors of the New England Journal of Medicine criticize the NEJM for its recent publication of a series of articles downplaying conflicts of interest.

-"For the most prominent journal of American medicine to offer so much precious real estate for arguments that are half-baked and tendentious is amazing."

-Buzzfeed looks at the history -- and present -- of how antipsychotic drugs became a common treatment for depression, despite their apparent lack of effectiveness.

A company that conducts clinical drug trials for pharmaceutical companies is taking legal action against the UK government over transparency requirements.

-An NEJM "Reader Poll" shows nearly 80% of respondents trusting that scientific reviews can be responsibly written by people taking money from pharmaceutical companies, but not who work with patient-advocacy groups.

-Is the World Health Organization moving towards developing tighter ties with corporations through its new "Framework of Engagement with non-State Actors"?

The US government's Centers for Disease Control have been taking millions of dollars in drug company money.

The American Psychiatric Foundation has announced the launch of a pharmaceutical company-funded national initiative to move people from jails into psychiatric care.

A manufacturer of a prescription omega-3 fatty acid derivative wants the right to tell physicians about benefits of its drug which the FDA has not approved.

-The average salary for psychiatrists and other mental health professionals is $216,000 per year, according to the Medscape Physician Compensation Report.

Drug companies must start publicly releasing information about different types of payments to Australia's physicians.

The editor of the Australian Medical Association's journal was fired after he voiced concerns about changes that he felt endangered the journal's independence.

The US FDA has requested that Otsuka "immediately cease" distributing some of its educational materials for its top-selling antipsychotic Abilify.

Two psychiatrists took money from a pharmaceutical company, and then did not disclose it when they lobbied state legislators about the company's drug.

Teams of researchers from around the world, including from the US government, tested 17,000 drug samples and found that up to 41% failed to meet quality standards.

-Surgeon James Rickert discusses financial conflicts of interest which affect physician decisions, and how patients can protect themselves.

On Canada's popular national CBC radio program The Sunday Edition, psychiatrist Jeffrey Lieberman today described Robert Whitaker as "a menace to society."

-MIA Bloggers Jonathan Leo and Jeffrey Lacasse review the New York Times' history of reporting on ADHD and the ensuing epidemic of ADHD.

-A psychiatrist asserts that psychiatrists and pharmaceutical companies never promoted the idea that serotonin deficiencies could cause depression, and suggests that no one at Mad in America has evidence that they did.