{"id":4629,"date":"2011-01-21T22:09:20","date_gmt":"2011-01-22T03:09:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/?p=4629"},"modified":"2011-01-22T22:25:46","modified_gmt":"2011-01-23T03:25:46","slug":"when-charlie-met-sally","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/2011\/01\/21\/when-charlie-met-sally\/","title":{"rendered":"when charlie met sally&#8230;"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div align=\"justify\">I thought I could put Drs. Schatzberg and Nemeroff on the side for a while after a few days with <strong><font color=\"#0099cc\">Corcept<\/font><\/strong>, but up they bounced when I read the article below. I&#8217;ll have to admit, it&#8217;s a classic. Remember back in late November, POGO wrote a <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pogo.org\/pogo-files\/letters\/public-health\/ph-iis-20101129.html\" target=\"_blank\"><font color=\"#200020\">letter<\/font><\/a><\/strong> to Dr. Francis Collins, Director of the NIH, about ghostwriting. One of their examples was a textbook by Nemeroff and Schatzberg written in 1997 [see <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/2010\/12\/01\/roaches\/\" target=\"_blank\"><font color=\"#200020\">roaches&#8230;<\/font><\/a><\/strong>]. Well they went ballistic at being accused of ghostwriting and lawyered up. It was all kind of silly because POGO&#8217;s evidence was in the range of incontrovertible. But the duo just keeps picking and picking:<\/div>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<div><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pogo.org\/pogo-files\/letters\/public-health\/ph-iis-20101208.html\" target=\"_blank\"><font color=\"#200020\">POGO&#8217;s first reply to letters from Dr. Schatzberg and Dr. Nemeroff<\/font><\/a><\/strong>, 12\/08\/2010.<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<div><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pogo.org\/pogo-files\/letters\/public-health\/ph-iis-20101209.html\" target=\"_blank\"><font color=\"#200020\">POGO&#8217;s second reply to letters from Dr. Schatzberg and Dr. Nemeroff<\/font><\/a><\/strong>, 12\/09\/2010.<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<div><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pogo.org\/pogo-files\/letters\/public-health\/ph-iis-20101216.html\" target=\"_blank\"><font color=\"#200020\">POGO&#8217;s third reply to letters from Dr. Schatzberg and Dr. Nemeroff<\/font><\/a><\/strong>, 12\/16\/2010.<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<div><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pogo.org\/pogo-files\/letters\/public-health\/ph-iis-20101223.html\" target=\"_blank\"><font color=\"#200020\">POGO&#8217;s fourth reply to letters from Dr. Schatzberg and Dr. Nemeroff<\/font><\/a><\/strong>, 12\/23\/2010.<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div align=\"justify\">I guess POGO author Paul Thacker hit a nerve. First, the <strong>American Psychiatric Association<\/strong> issued an immediate supporting <a href=\"http:\/\/www.psych.org\/MainMenu\/Newsroom\/NewsReleases\/2010-News-Releases\/Manual.aspx\" target=\"_blank\"><strong><font color=\"#200020\">Press Release<\/font><\/strong><\/a> for them. Now, the the <strong>American Psychiatric Publishing Inc. <\/strong>is providing evidence [well, sort of&#8230;]:<\/div>\n<blockquote>\n<div align=\"center\"><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/pn.psychiatryonline.org\/content\/46\/2\/1.1.full\" target=\"_blank\">APPI Documents Refute Claims About Text&#8217;s Authorship<\/a><br \/>              <sup>Galleys and manuscript proofs stored in files of American Psychiatric Publishing Inc. provide clear proof of active author                      involvement in the development of the text throughout all of its iterations.                   <\/sup><br \/>                Psychiatric News<\/strong><br \/>                by Mark Moran<br \/>                January 21, 2011<\/div>\n<p align=\"justify\">APA is protesting allegations that a 1999 book published by American Psychiatric Publishing Inc. on psychotropic prescribing                   for primary care physicians was ghostwritten, but significant aspects of the allegation&mdash;published by the <em>New York Times<\/em> on November 29, 2010&mdash;have since been retracted and corrected by the newspaper&#8230;<\/p>\n<div align=\"justify\"><strong><font color=\"#300030\">In a joint statement to <em>Psychiatric News<\/em>,  Nemeroff and Schatzberg emphasized that STI had an unrestricted grant  from SmithKline Beecham and was in no way working                   for the drug company. &ldquo;SKB did not write the book nor  was STI hired by SKB to work on it,&rdquo; the authors said. &ldquo;The article                   indicates the company gave an unrestricted grant to  STI, and that was confirmed independently by a SKB spokesperson. Thus                   the [original] headline comports neither with the  reality nor the article.&rdquo;                                      <\/font><\/strong><\/div>\n<p align=\"justify\">They added, &ldquo;In all branches of academic  medicine, graduate students, research assistants, fellows, and others  contribute                   in various ways to scientific manuscripts. Their  contributions are recognized as either co-authors or in the  acknowledgements                   for their technical or other assistance. Over the last  decade, guidelines for authorship have evolved but were certainly not                   as well established in 1997 as they are today, when  this project was initiated. Nevertheless, appropriate credit to the STI                   staff was provided. It is also important to note that  we were not remunerated by SKB for any of this work. Our desire to  educate                   primary care physicians led us to convince SKB to  provide an unrestricted educational grant for editorial assistance and  to                   distribute the primer to family doctors.&rdquo;                <\/p>\n<div align=\"justify\"><strong><font color=\"#300030\">In an interview with <em>Psychiatric News<\/em>,  McMillen said that APPI has extensive files, proofs, and manuscript  versions of the book that clearly demonstrate the active                   involvement of Schatzberg and Nemeroff in every stage  of the book&#8217;s development. &ldquo;I&#8217;ve seen the files, and you can clearly                   see author involvement,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Schatzberg and  Nemeroff have margin notes in all of the galleys with their initials  throughout                   all of the various iterations.<\/font><\/strong> We also had the book  peer reviewed by more people than is routine. The peer-review comments                   were sent to [STI], and every single one of them was  incorporated. The writer for STI was clearly working for us. &ldquo;To call that ghostwritten is just absurd,&rdquo; McMillen said.   <\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div align=\"justify\">This story is older that just a month or so. As far back as 1993, Sally Laden of STI was involved with Dr. Nemeroff, coordinating his moderation of the <a href=\"http:\/\/pogoblog.typepad.com\/pogo\/gw-attachment-a.html\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>SKB Medical Advisory Board<\/strong><\/a> meeting after <strong><font color=\"#200020\">Paxil<\/font><\/strong> was put on the market. Much later, in 2006, Charlie was busted for writing an <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/npp\/journal\/v31\/n7\/full\/1301082a.html\"><strong><font color=\"#300030\">article<\/font><\/strong><\/a> in <strong><font color=\"#200020\">Neuropsychopharmacology<\/font><\/strong> [a journal he edited], that favorably reviewed the Cyberonics Vagus Nerve Stimulator [for depression] without disclosing his financial connections with the company. He lost his editorship in disgrace [<strong><a href=\"http:\/\/chronicle.com\/article\/Journal-Editor-Quits-Over-C\/37482\/\" target=\"_blank\">Journal Editor Quits Over Conflict of Interest<\/a><\/strong>]. And there was Sally, still with him. In that article:<\/div>\n<div align=\"center\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"520\" vspace=\"6\" border=\"1\" src=\"http:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/images\/cyber.png\" \/><\/div>\n<div align=\"justify\">At that time, the <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/hcrenewal.blogspot.com\/2006\/08\/money-and-medical-journals.html\"><strong><font color=\"#0099cc\">Healthcare Renewal<\/font><\/strong><\/a> blog had this to say:<\/div>\n<blockquote>\n<div align=\"justify\">&#8230;In presenting this summary, the review carefully followed the  corporation&#8217;s marketing message and branding language. There is no  discernible difference between the corporation&#8217;s press releases and the  text of the review article on these topics. The review did not address  the controversy surrounding the FDA approval process. In these respects,  the review has the hallmarks of a ghostwritten article. As described by  Leemon McHenry, who has written on conflict of interest issues in  medicine, &quot;I have &#8230; seen contracts between the pharmaceutical  companies and the ghostwriting companies with the plan of production and  the budget. What is particularly interesting about these is the fact  that it is clear that the company owns the manuscript until it is  released to the &quot;authors.&quot; The company&#8217;s legal department reviews the  manuscript and releases it at the end of the process. The first draft  isn&#8217;t even reviewed by the &quot;authors.&quot; This is all internal until the  second draft.&quot; <strong><font color=\"#300030\">It appears very likely that the VNS review was carefully  screened by the corporation to ensure that the first draft was &quot;on  message&quot; before being released to the &quot;authors&quot; for them to strengthen  the hard science surrounding the stealth infomercial&#8230; <\/font><\/strong><\/div>\n<p>      <\/p>\n<div align=\"justify\">&#8230;the article acknowledged &quot;editorial support&quot; from a professional writer,  who acknowledged to the Wall Street Journal that she was employed by  the corporation for the task of writing a first draft. Although the  authors claimed they provided substantive input after the first draft,  it is ethically dubious to use a hired writer for a first draft.<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div align=\"justify\">So now to the textbook in question, the 1997&nbsp; <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Recognition-Treatment-Psychiatric-Disorders-Psychopharmacology\/dp\/0880489901\" target=\"_blank\"><font color=\"#200020\">Recognition and Treatment of Psychiatric Disorders: A Psychopharmacology Handbook for Primary Care<\/font><\/a><\/strong> by Drs. Nemeroff and Schatzberg. The <a href=\"http:\/\/pogoblog.typepad.com\/pogo\/gw-attachment-e.html\" target=\"_blank\"><strong><font color=\"#200020\">correspondence<\/font><\/strong><\/a> between Dr. Nemeroff and Sally Laden is clear as a bell. And the authors say this in the Forward to the book:<\/div>\n<div align=\"center\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"396\" vspace=\"6\" height=\"353\" border=\"1\" src=\"http:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/images\/coniglio.gif\" \/>&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div align=\"justify\">So, in the 2006 example, what       does &quot;editorial support in developing early drafts&quot; even mean? It&#8217;s backwards. What&#8217;s to <strong>edit<\/strong> when there&#8217;s       nothing yet there? That makes no sense. And in the example of the 1997 book, the <strong><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/pogoblog.typepad.com\/pogo\/gw-attachment-e.html\"><font color=\"#200020\">letter from STI<\/font><\/a><\/strong> provided by POGO is a schedule of drafts and when the authors will get to see them. There&#8217;s a good example of such a contract from the&nbsp; Martin Keller\/Paxil Study 329 case <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.healthyskepticism.org\/files\/docs\/gsk\/paroxetine\/study329\/19980403STIContract.pdf\"><strong><font color=\"#200020\">here<\/font><\/strong><\/a> [Sally Laden of STI once again]. Both follow the pattern described in the <strong><font color=\"#200020\">Healthcare Renewal Post<\/font><\/strong> mentioned above [ <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/hcrenewal.blogspot.com\/2006\/08\/money-and-medical-journals.html\">Money           and Medical Journals<\/a><\/strong>]:<\/div>\n<blockquote>\n<div align=\"justify\">As described by Leemon McHenry, who has written on           conflict of interest issues in medicine, &#8216;I have &#8230; seen           contracts between the pharmaceutical companies and the           ghostwriting companies with the plan of production and the           budget. What is particularly interesting about these is the           fact that it is clear that the company owns the manuscript           until it is released to the <em>authors<\/em>. The company&#8217;s           legal department reviews the manuscript and releases it at the           end of the process. The first draft isn&#8217;t even reviewed by the           <em>authors<\/em>. This is all internal until the second draft.&#8217;           It appears very likely that the VNS review was carefully           screened by the corporation to ensure that the first draft was           &#8216;on message&#8217; before being released to the <em>authors<\/em> for           them <strong>to strengthen the hard science surrounding the             stealth infomercial<\/strong>.&quot;<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div align=\"justify\">The <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/pn.psychiatryonline.org\/content\/46\/2\/1.1.full\"><strong><font color=\"#200020\">APPI article<\/font><\/strong><\/a> in the <em>Psychiatric News<\/em> [above] defends Dr. Schatzberg and Nemeroff saying:<\/div>\n<blockquote>\n<div align=\"justify\">In an interview with the<em> Psychiatric News<\/em>,           McMillen said that APPI has extensive files, proofs, and           manuscript versions of the book that clearly demonstrate the           active involvement of Schatzberg and Nemeroff in every stage           of the book&#8217;s development. &ldquo;I&#8217;ve seen the files, and you can           clearly see author involvement,&rdquo; he said.&nbsp; <\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div align=\"justify\"><strong><font color=\"#200020\">My point is obvious. Of course the authors wrote in the       margins! Of course they were involved! That&#8217;s what the authors are for: to add their names and &quot;to         strengthen the hard science surrounding the stealth infomercial.&quot;       What a strange world it is where evidence of &quot;author involvement&quot; is       considered a defense against ghostwriting. Anything less wouldn&#8217;t be ghostwriting, it       would be plagiarism. The APPI evidence is actually closer to an indictment than a defense.<\/font><\/strong><\/div>\n<p align=\"justify\">I honestly hope that Schatzberg and Nemeroff push this into a courtroom [not that I wish it on POGO to have to bear the hassle and the expense]. But I&#8217;d love to see those documents&nbsp; with the marginalia, and I&#8217;d love to read a deposition from the ever elusive Sally Laden. Those endless explanations and excuses these two men have rolled out with each infraction are the kinds of things kids say when they didn&#8217;t do their homework. A decent lawyer will make mincemeat out of them in a blue second. Initialed notes in the marginalia is hardly a viable defense if it&#8217;s somebody else&#8217;s margin. And this notion of &quot;unrestricted educational grant&quot; as a defense against Conflicts of Interest won&#8217;t fly with any Jury that&#8217;s alert and awake. <\/p>\n<div align=\"justify\">Truth be told, ghost-writing usually refers to someone who is good at writing taking ideas from the supposed author and turning them into an acceptable literary production. What has probably happened in a lot of these medical articles and books is that the writer has taken the message from a sponsor, put it into a readable form, and the supposed author then adds the science that legitimizes the endeavor. So there are two ghosts involved. I guess it&#8217;s <strong><em><font color=\"#200020\">ghost<u>s<\/u>writing<\/font><\/em><\/strong>. <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I thought I could put Drs. Schatzberg and Nemeroff on the side for a while after a few days with Corcept, but up they bounced when I read the article below. I&#8217;ll have to admit, it&#8217;s a classic. Remember back in late November, POGO wrote a letter to Dr. Francis Collins, Director of the NIH, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4629","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4629","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4629"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4629\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7310,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4629\/revisions\/7310"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4629"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}