Shining a light on industry collaboration

摘要

Academic and industry research collaboration has become increasingly common in clinical medicine. Overtheyears, we have worked in various departments, across multiple specialties, where clinicians act as investigators, recruiting and enrolling patients in industry funded drugtrials, oras academic researchers conducting industry funded studies. We noticed that some academics received industry funding to conduct clinical research, but soon discovered that they had limited freedom. They found that the funder ran every research meeting and essentially had deciding power. Another academic-who has been involved in many industry funded trials-described how they only look at what they or their institution get out of the collaboration before they sign a contract with an industry funder. They then expect the steering committees and ethical review boards to oversee responsible research conduct.