A new report by the Association of American Medical Colleges urges U.S. teaching hospitals to establish policies that manage financial relationships between physicians and industry so that they do not influence patient care, according to an AAMC news release.
The report, titled "In the Interest of Patients: Recommendations for Physician Financial Relationships and Clinical Decision Making" provides guidance on how academic medical centers can identify, evaluate and disclose conflicts of interest in clinical care.
The report is the work of a 20-member task force convened by the AAMC in 2009. In the report, the task force points out that partnerships between academic medical centers and industry are essential to innovation and create powerful collaborations that benefit all patients. However, the presence of individual or institutional financial interests in these relationships sometimes creates perceived or real conflicts of interests in patient care.
"Because patients and the health of the public are top priorities for the nation's medical schools and teaching hospitals, we must uphold the highest standards of professionalism, while maintaining principled relationships with industry to improve patient care," AAMC Chief Health Care Officer Joanne M. Conroy, MD, said in the release. "The AAMC believes this report reflects these values by recommending institutions develop systems to address conflicts of interest in ways that protect patients overall and preserve the integrity of individual relationships between physicians and their patients."
The report specifically recommends that academic medical centers:
The report, titled "In the Interest of Patients: Recommendations for Physician Financial Relationships and Clinical Decision Making" provides guidance on how academic medical centers can identify, evaluate and disclose conflicts of interest in clinical care.
The report is the work of a 20-member task force convened by the AAMC in 2009. In the report, the task force points out that partnerships between academic medical centers and industry are essential to innovation and create powerful collaborations that benefit all patients. However, the presence of individual or institutional financial interests in these relationships sometimes creates perceived or real conflicts of interests in patient care.
"Because patients and the health of the public are top priorities for the nation's medical schools and teaching hospitals, we must uphold the highest standards of professionalism, while maintaining principled relationships with industry to improve patient care," AAMC Chief Health Care Officer Joanne M. Conroy, MD, said in the release. "The AAMC believes this report reflects these values by recommending institutions develop systems to address conflicts of interest in ways that protect patients overall and preserve the integrity of individual relationships between physicians and their patients."
The report specifically recommends that academic medical centers:
- Establish mechanisms to identify physician-industry financial relationships and evaluate their potential to bias the clinical decision-making of physicians
- Consider payments for services, royalties and ownership when assessing individual related financial interests
- Set thresholds for physician reporting and institutions' evaluation of reported interests
- Make available to their patient communities and the public information on the industry relationships of their physicians, their value and efforts to mitigate any bias resulting from these relationships.