December 29, 2015 – Evidence and Profit

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Anchor lead:  What should be done to compensate for industry objectives in scientific research? Elizabeth Tracey reports

Should you be concerned that when a clinical trial is conducted by industry the results may not be objective?  Stephan Ehrhardt, lead author of a recent Johns Hopkins study finding that industry is conducting more research while the NIH is funding less, describes how bias might enter the equation.

Ehrhardt: I don’t think that industry funded trials per se are biased. Industry of course has a vested interest in showing that their drug is good because they invested millions of dollars in developing their drug.  When I’m an industry investigator then I may not be super inclined to pit my drug against some other drug or intervention that might perform better than my newly developed drug so in that sense the issue might be bias.   :30

Ehrhardt suggests that partnerships between industry and academia might help.  At Johns Hopkins, I’m Elizabeth Tracey.