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Ghosts Everywhere.

UD thanks Corey, a reader, for sending her this important article from a writer we’ve already seen at University DiariesSergio Sismondo. With Mathieu Doucet, Sismondo broadens his attack on the repellent and dangerous practice of ghostwriting among university professors of medicine.

Here’s their abstract:

It is by now no secret that some scientific articles are ghost authored – that
is, written by someone other than the person whose name appears at the
top of the article. Ghost authorship, however, is only one sort of ghosting.
In this article, we present evidence that pharmaceutical companies engage
in the ghost management of the scientific literature, by controlling or
shaping several crucial steps in the research, writing, and publication of
scientific articles. Ghost management allows the pharmaceutical industry to
shape the literature in ways that serve its interests.

This article aims to reinforce and expand publication ethics as an important
area of concern for bioethics. Since ghost-managed research is primarily
undertaken in the interests of marketing, large quantities of medical
research violate not just publication norms but also research ethics. Much
of this research involves human subjects, and yet is performed not primarily
to increase knowledge for broad human benefit, but to disseminate results
in the service of profits. Those who sponsor, manage, conduct, and publish
such research therefore behave unethically, since they put patients at risk
without justification. This leads us to a strong conclusion: if medical journals
want to ensure that the research they publish is ethically sound, they should
not publish articles that are commercially sponsored.

Link to the full article.

Margaret Soltan, June 22, 2010 5:39PM
Posted in: hoax

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