Department of Orthopaedics and Rehabilitation, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT 06520-8071, USA.
Spine J. 2011 Jan;11(1):1-8. doi: 10.1016/j.spinee.2010.08.022. Epub 2010 Oct 8.
In recent years, greater attention has been directed toward determining how potential financial conflicts of interest may affect the integrity of biomedical research. To address this issue, various disclosure policies have been adopted in an attempt to increase the transparency of this process. However, the consistency of such reporting among spine surgeons remains unknown. This study quantifies the variability in the self-reported disclosures of individual authors presenting at multiple spine conferences during the same year.
The author disclosure information published for the 2008 North American Spine Society (NASS), Cervical Spine Research Society (CSRS), and Scoliosis Research Society (SRS), conferences were compiled into a database. We evaluated the disclosure policy for each society and compared the disclosure listings of authors who presented at more than one of these meetings.
Disclosure records were available for 1,231 authors at NASS, 550 at CSRS, and 642 at SRS. Of these individuals, 278 (NASS), 129 (CSRS), and 181 (SRS) presented at one of the other conferences and 40 presented at all three conferences. North American Spine Society and CSRS required disclosure of all financial relationships, whereas SRS only requested disclosures pertinent to authors' presentations. Of the 153 authors who presented at the NASS and CSRS meetings, 51% exhibited discrepancies in their disclosure information. In contrast, only 9% of the 205 individuals whose data was listed at both the NASS and SRS conferences demonstrated irregularities. Similarly, 18% of the 56 authors who had provided information to both CSRS and SRS were inconsistent in their reporting.
These findings emphasize the significant variability that currently exists in the reporting of financial conflicts of interest by authors who presented at three major spine conferences within the past year. We believe these discrepancies are likely because of confusion regarding what relationships should be acknowledged in certain situations and the clear lack of uniformity among the disclosure policies established by these various associations.
This study evaluates financial conflicts of interests in clinical research.
近年来，人们越来越关注潜在的利益冲突如何影响生物医学研究的完整性。为了解决这个问题，已经采取了各种披露政策，试图提高这一过程的透明度。然而，脊柱外科医生在报告此类信息方面的一致性仍不得而知。本研究量化了在同一年多次参加脊柱会议的个别作者的自我报告披露的变化。
作者披露信息公布了 2008 年北美脊柱协会（NASS）、颈椎研究协会（CSRS）和脊柱侧凸研究协会（SRS）会议，被汇编成一个数据库。我们评估了每个协会的披露政策，并比较了在这些会议中的多个会议上发表演讲的作者的披露清单。
NASS 有 1231 位作者、CSRS 有 550 位作者、SRS 有 642 位作者的披露记录可用。这些人中，278 人（NASS）、129 人（CSRS）和 181 人（SRS）在其他会议之一上发表演讲，40 人在所有三个会议上发表演讲。北美脊柱协会和颈椎研究协会要求披露所有财务关系，而脊柱侧凸研究协会仅要求披露与作者演讲相关的信息。在参加 NASS 和 CSRS 会议的 153 位作者中，有 51%的人披露信息存在差异。相比之下，在被列入 NASS 和 SRS 会议的 205 位作者中，只有 9%的人报告存在不规则现象。同样，在向 CSRS 和 SRS 提供信息的 56 位作者中，有 18%的人报告存在不一致的情况。
这些发现强调了在过去一年中参加三个主要脊柱会议的作者在报告财务利益冲突方面存在显著差异。我们认为这些差异可能是由于对在某些情况下应承认哪些关系存在混淆，以及这些不同协会制定的披露政策之间缺乏明确的一致性。
本研究评估了临床研究中的财务利益冲突。
