Dispute at the American Society of Hypertension Over Industry Involvement

The Boston Globe reported that a dispute has broken out at the American Society of Hypertension over the influence of pharmaceutical compan...

Deferred Prosecution for Bristol Myers Squibb for Fraud Charges

The NY Times reported that federal prosecutors will defer prosecution of Bristol Myers Squibb for alleged manipulation of inventory designe...

A Not-For-Profit Hospital Sues a Former Donor

The Boston Globe reported that the not-for-profit Massachusetts Eye & Ear Infirmary has sued a foundation for failure to deliver a pled...

No Federal Standards for Reporting Flawed Medical Devices

The NY Times reported about recent recalls of implanted cardiac devices. One important point the reporter made was that so far the US Food ...

Big Conflicts of Interest Alleged at Small Massachusetts Hospital

The Boston Globe reported on the travails of tiny Hubbard Regional Hospital in Webster, MA, allegedly brought on by mismanagement. The 76-y...

Not Very Slick Management: Administrators Alleged to Ignore Surgical Instruments "Disinfected" with Used Hydraulic Fluid

From the Associated Press, via the Charlotte Observer, came the story that a mix-up at Duke Health Raleigh and Durham Regional hospitals, b...

MedRants Blogger's Op-Ed Against Direct to Consumer Drug Advertising

Fellow health care blogger Robert Centor MD (of MedRants ) published an op-ed in USA Today advocating that direct to consumer (DTC) advertis...

How Johnson & Johnson Marketed Propulsid

The NY Times reported on the events leading up to Johnson & Johnson's withdrawal of Propulsid, based on documents made available by...

The AMA may be "getting it"

AMA pursues doctor hiring reform Miami Herald June 10, 2005 In a move that could have widespread effects on the nation's healthcare indu...

Government officials who "get it"

I heard Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt speak at the AHRQ Annual Patient Safety and Health Information Tec...

"Scientists Behaving Badly" and "Unreasonable Managerial Demands"

An article in Nature reports on "Scientists Behaving Badly."(1) This was a broadly based anonymous survey, with a 52% response rat...

Pfizer Dissident Unplugged

The New York Times reported that Dr. Peter Rost, a Pfizer executive who publicly spoke out in favor of importation of low cost drugs, lost ...

More Exaggerated Hospital List Prices

The Opinion Journal (the on-line opinion site of the Wall Street Journal) has a long article about one family's experience in the UK and...

Local "Naturopathic Doctor" Shut Down

Our own Providence Journal reported that the RI Health Department shut down the office of a "naturopathic doctor," John E. Curran,...

Allegations That Merck Threatened Researchers Who Expressed Doubts About Vioxx

The Philadelphia Inquirer reported a series of allegations that a top Merck executive threatened and intimidated physicians who questioned ...

Bristol-Myers-Squibb Settling Case of Inflated Sales Figures

The NY Times reported that Bristol-Myers-Squibb will soon be paying about $300 million in exchange for the US Department of Justice deferrin...

More on the Alliance Between the University of Pennsylvania and the Tai Sophia Institute

The Associated Press has done a follow-up of the new relationship between the University of Pennsylvania Medical School and the Tai Sophia I...

Georgia State Senator, Charged with Defrauding Hospital and Medical School, Convicted

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that Georgia State Senator Charles W Walker was convicted of 127 counts in a 137 count indictment...

Opinions About the Regulating the Pharmaceutical Industry

Two major newspapers have published opinion pieces condemning current pharmaceutical industry practices, and calling for better regulation o...

Secrecy

I'm trying to catch up after a busy weekend, and there is a lot to catch up on... Last week in the Hartford Courant, an op-ed article en...

New Marketing Campaign "To Build Emotional Ties Between Merck and Consumers"

The NY Times reported that Merck is embarking on a big $20 million marketing campaign to "help burnish its corporate brand rather than ...

Marketing Normal Pressure Hydrocephalus

Joseph Friedman, a neurologist here in Rhode Island, wrote an op-ed in the Providence Journal that documented yet another story about appare...

Guidant's Short Circuit, Reloaded

The NY Times reported that after Guidant discovered a defect in its implantable cardiac defibrillator (ICD) that allowed the device to short...

CPOE cybernetic miracles not yet achieved

Lest hospital executives believe that computers are going to be a cure-all for all that ails medicine, here's another sobering report on...

More Accusations of Harsh Bill Collecting Tactics: Intermountain Health Care

Intermountain Health Care (IHC, in Utah) is another large health care system that has been accused of employing harsh collection tactics aga...

Drug Studies Required by FDA Fast Track Process Never Completed

Help, help, there is so much going on I a can't keep up with it anymore.... The Los Angeles Times just revealed a report by the staff of...

Medical Whistleblowers' Roundtable

PLoS Medicine just published a summary of a round-table discussion by notable whistleblowers about pharmaceutical companies' research an...

More Fall-Out From Start of Congressional Hearings on Not-For-Profit Hospitals

The beginning congressional investigations of not-for-profit hospitals' tax exemptions are raising interest in the business practices of...

Media Reports on How Pharmaceutical Companies May Manipulate Information

Newspapers have become interested, again, in the issue of pharmaceutical companies manipulating information supplied to the public or health...

Editorial Argues Against Softening NIH Conflict of Interest Rules

The question of whether the NIH should soften its now stringent conflict of interest rules re-surfaced in an editorial in the Hartford Coura...

Should US Not-For-Profit Hospitals Lose Their Privileged Status?

The Baltimore Sun reports that both the US House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee and the Senate Finance Committee are opening en...

A Troubling Study of the Contracts Between Medical Schools and Corporate Research Sponsors

The NEJM article about contracts for clinical trials between academic health centers (AHCs) and pharmaceutical companies mentioned in an ear...

Wall Street Journal: Medical Editor Turns Activist On Drug Trials

NEJM editor Drazen returns to the Light Side of the Force. The revelation about academic medical centers willingly accepting ghost-writing o...

"Another Guy Who Ethically Ran Amok": Bellevue Hospital Executive Fired

The New York Times reports yet another hospital chief executive leaving in disgrace. Carlos F. Perez, executive director of Bellevue Hospita...

Lawyers Sue Hospital Based on What it Advertised

Lawyers have noticed how hospitals are making exaggerated claims about their services, as reported by the Boston Globe . The story involves ...

Fewer Physicians Interested in Generalist Careers

There is more information available about the decreasing number of physicians interested in being generalists. A detailed survey based study...

Guideant's Short Circuit

The New York Times reports yet another story of flawed implantable cardiac defibrillators (ICDs). This time, Guidant Corporation revealed th...

No More Free Viagra for Sex Offenders

There are so many stories popping up now that I am having a hard time keeping up, but here goes... Unintended flaws of bureaucratic decision...

From Nevada, More on Hospitals' List Prices

The Las Vegas Review-Journal reported on the high cost of hospitalization in Nevada, where it asserted hospital charges are currently the hi...

Conflicts of Interest and Jackson Memorial Hospital's Pharmacy Contract

The latest in the hit-parade of hospital management shenanigans, highlighting issues of conflict of interest, is this story in the Miami Her...

Support for the "Endangered Primary Care MD"

An op-ed piece in the Boston Globe by Ellen Lutch Bender , the Director of Health Care Strategies for the law firm Brown Rudnick, entitled &...

Comments by Jacobi Hospital's Former Executive Director: "I Feel Really Good"

The Executive Director of Jacobi Hospital, who was fired because the hospital failed to notify hundreds of women about concerning Pap test ...

Secret Hospital "List Prices" Revealed in San Jose

A real health care market would require we have informed consumers who can make rational decisions. We have shown how some hospitals seem to...