No more free lunches: Relationship between industry and research does  not bear scrutiny

doi:10.1136/bmj.327.7410.342-a

BMJ 2003;327:342 (9 August), doi:10.1136/bmj.327.7410.342-a

Letter

No more free lunches

Relationship between industry and research does not bear scrutiny

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

EDITOR—Medical equipment is also presented with studies whose impartiality is open to question.¹ At worst, the researchis blatant hype.

The relationship between industry and research is not oftenscrutinised. In my discipline of midwifery, electronic fetalmonitoring has the dubious honour of having been widely implementedwithout clear evidence of efficacy or safety. In the decadessince it has failed to fulfil its much touted promise of betteroutcomes.

Artificial breastmilk substitutes are another example. The relationship between industry and health services does not always bear scrutiny.It seems to be worst in the United States, where women havesamples foisted on them as they leave maternity wards becausethe hospital has promised the manufacturer that these "gifts"will be distributed in return for discounted prices on theproduct for inhospital use.

That healthcare professionals can be bought for a self adhesivememo pad, pen, coffee mug, . . . [Full text of this article]

Rachel Myr, midwife

Sørlandet Sykehus Kristiansand, Norway rmyr@online.no