From the New York Times:
Dr. Manoj V. Waikar [is] among the top five [Eli Lilly drug rep] earners this year, received $74,850 for consulting and speaking at 51 events, according to Lilly’s on-line faculty registry.
… [D]octors [like Waikar are] essentially are giving canned speeches written by the drug companies; after all, … med schools would not allow students to present somebody else’s work. And so Stanford prohibits full faculty members from participating in drug company speakers’ bureaus. But unpaid adjunct instructors, like Dr. Waikar [Stanford lists him as still active, but his website has him teaching for them most recently seven years ago], are allowed to, as long as they are not using their Stanford titles.
… But Dr. Bernard Lo, the director of the medical ethics program at the medical school of the University of California, San Francisco, said that because drug companies controlled the content of such speeches, they should have their own employees give such talks. “Anyone who teaches medical students or residents should be bound by the same regulations,” Dr. Lo said. “Your own work has to be your own work.”
Stanford is reviewing its policy to determine if any clarifications or changes are needed, a spokesman for the medical school wrote in an e-mail message.
Forgive UD for doubting that as Waikar sells himself to Lilly he puts aside the Stanford connection. Names like Stanford represent precisely the aura of neutrality the company’s after.
UD‘s followed, on this blog, many embarrassing stories about adjunct medical school faculty, from Michael Jackson’s sperm depositor at UCLA all the way down to energizer bunnies like Waikar.
UD wonders why universities don’t give a shit about these clowns.
November 5th, 2009 at 6:55AM
There are, however, some actual scientists working for pharmaceutical companies– Here‘s a pharma chemist’s list of amazing "Things I won’t Work With".