What is Journal Watch? This is a widely read online digest of research materials that's run by the Massachusetts Medical Society, the same organization that brings you the New England Journal of Medicine. And like several chastened medical journals, Journal Watch is about to adopt new guidelines for disclosing an author's
conflict of interest, The Wall Street Journal* reports.
Of course, the move didn't come without first being criticized and embarrassed. An April 26 article by a psychiatrist, Claudio Soares, argued that despite cautions from the FDA and medical societies, there was considerable data to support antidepressant use by pregnant women. Soares, a professor at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, has been a researcher, consultant or speaker for Forest Labs, Glaxo, Wyeth and Lilly, which sell antidepressants
After a reader inquired about these ties, info about Soares's financial relationships was added to the article on May 31, the Journal reports. The article also triggered a rebuke from Adam Urato, a perinatologist at New England Medical Center in Boston, who said the piece minimized dangers posed by some antidepressants and should have noted the relationships.
Brown University professor Sandra Carson, who edits the section of Journal Watch that published the Soares piece, told the Journal that author disclosures were on the Web site on April 26. But to find the info, finding the info was a convulted process.
Readers had to go to the main page of the Women's Health section and find a link in small type entitled "More about Journal Watch Women's Health and its board," where Soares is listed as an associate editor. The reader then had to click on a link, "about Dr. Soares," to get to a page listing his bio. On that page, clicking the "disclosure" link listed his financial relationships. Most major medical journals include any financial disclosure on the first or last page of an article.
Under Journal Watch's new system, to be adopted later this month, online readers will be able to click on an author's name and instantly see disclosures about his or her financial ties to drug makers and other sources of support. The site, aimed at doctors, summarizes significant articles on recent medical journals.