Should the drug industry work with key opinion leaders? Yes

This question is a microcosm of the broader debate about how the drug industry and clinicians should interact. It leads to two tempting but indefensible end points—either that doctors are immune to marketing and should be free to do as they wish with industry or that industry is inherently corrupting, making all contact with it unethical.1

Both positions are flawed, and the reality is much more complex: neither medicine nor industry can realise their true value independently of one another.1 Both have a role in the advancement and delivery of health care. It is not in the interest of the industry to have its products used incorrectly or in the wrong patients, and there are appreciable benefits to healthcare professionals from interactions between industry and opinion leaders.