PROFESSIONStudy highlights drug gift dilemmaResearcher says discussion needed on impact of drug company marketing materials saturating doctors' offices.By Andis Robeznieks, amednews staff. Nov. 3, 2003. Doctors hold "fairly lenient views" on the ethics of accepting gifts from pharmaceutical detailers or attending drug company-sponsored events, according to a recent study in the Archives of Internal Medicine. Researchers at the University of South Carolina in Columbia presented faculty and resident physicians at their institution with 18 scenarios such as accepting golf balls, textbooks, drug samples, meals and trips and asked them to rate how ethically problematic each was. The study, published in the Archives' Oct. 13 issue, states that doctors felt that accepting most of these did not pose problems; however, some of them made distinctions based on the cost of the gift or whether the gift or activity was educational or recreational. "I recognize that it's a snapshot of a group of physicians in one institution," said lead author Allan S. Brett, MD, director of the university's Division of General Internal Medicine. "I'm quite confident the results would be more or less the same across the country, but you'd like to see it replicated before you draw definitive conclusions." Dr. Brett said he was more interested in turning discussion away from fine distinctions between acceptable and unacceptable gifts to how doctors' offices have become saturated with drug company materials. [...]Full text of American Medical News content is available to AMA members and paid subscribers.
Copyright 2003 American Medical Association. All rights reserved.
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