Canadian case questions funding

An external review of a dispute between a researcher, her sponsor (a pharmaceutical firm), and Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children has called on the Medical Research Council of Canada to consider how best to handle third party funding of clinical research.

The review exonerated the hospital of any wrongdoing and denied the claim of the researcher involved in the case, Dr Nancy Olivieri, that the hospital refused her legal support. It argued that she failed to report to the hospital's research ethics board her concerns about the possible limitations and side effects of a drug she was testing (deferiprone). Dr Olivieri stated that she acted on legal advice in this regard, and she called the review “no more than a whitewash.” She said that the hospital board was “trying to turn on an individual.”

Dr Olivieri went public when she became convinced that the drug could cause liver toxicity, despite the fact that she had signed a confidentiality agreement with the sponsor and manufacturer, Apotex. After Apotex threatened her with legal action, a dispute arose between many hospital researchers and the hospital administration and created a public furore (5September 1997,p 618).

The dispute highlights the need for improved guidelines on commercially sponsored research in universities and hospitals. In a report written at the request of Dr Olivieri, Professor Arthur Schafer, director of the Centre for Professional and Applied Ethics at the University of Manitoba, suggested that declining government funding has led to increased funding by pharmaceutical firms. The danger is that business values (that is, profits) will come to dominate the traditional values of medical science (patients' safety and research integrity),he said.