US Senator Grassley releases medical ghostwriting report, recommends NIH promote transparency

US Senator Charles (Chuck) Grassley (Republican, Iowa) has released a staff report of the Committee on Finance on the practice of medical ghostwriting and is urging the National Institutes of Health to incorporate its findings in new, final disclosure guidelines. The committee staff report is based on a two-year review of the role that pharmaceutical and medical device companies play in developing articles for publication in medical journals.

Sen Grassley has expressed concern about the lack of transparency when industry pays third parties to write articles for medical journals which are then marketed to research and other physicians for their signatures.

Last year, Sen Grassley wrote to eight major medical journals and 10 leading medical schools asking them to describe their policies on ghostwriting as part of his continuing effort to shed light on financial ties between the pharmaceutical and device industries and medical professionals. Prior to that, he asked two major drug companies (Wyeth [now Pfizer] and Merck & Co) about allegations that they hired ghostwriters to draft articles promoting company products and sought academics to sign on as primary authors.