The headline of an Associated Press article published yesterday (July 18) reads, "JAMA says docs misled over industry ties." Referring to the JAMA article "Migraine and Risk of Cardiovascular Disease in Women," Dr. Catherine DeAngelis, the editor in chief of JAMA, told the Associated Press that JAMA editors didn't know the authors of the article had received research funding or consulting fees from manufacturers of Migraine and heart treatments until The Associated Press informed her of them late last week.

It's a standard requirement for journal publication that authors disclose any potential financial conflicts. Dr Tobias Kurth, the lead author on the study, said they didn't report any financial ties, thinking them irrelevant because the study promoted no drugs. It reports a potential link between Migraine with aura in women and cardiovascular disease. The study was part of the Womens Health Study, which was funded by the National Institutes of Health with no funding from industry. In a telephone interview, Kurth stated, "They do not represent a conflict of interest."

Co-author Nancy Cook, ScD, commented, "I do believe that conflicts sometimes exist and should be disclosed, but I hope this issue does not get overblown by the media. I think that could harm the reputations of honest and well-meaning researchers and lead to public mistrust where none is warranted.

It actually seems that the issue is already being a bit overblown by the media. Should the researchers have disclosed their financial ties to pharmaceutical companies? Maybe so, but nowhere in the AP article is anyone from JAMA quoted as saying that they were "misled" by the authors. That seems to have been said by whomever wrote the headline of the AP article.

In my opinion, it probably never occurred to the authors to list ties to pharmaceutical companies when writing about a study that had nothing to do with medications. Dr. DeAngelis or the JAMA editors, on the other had, should always ask authors who don't list any potential associations since it's virtually impossible for any medical researcher to be free of ties to pharmaceutical companies since they fund the vast majority of research.

Rather than pointing fingers and writing sensationalistic headlines, it would be better to set a procedure at JAMA to avoid situations and for now, pay attention to the important results of this study.

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Resources:

• Tanner, Lindsey; Associated Press Medical Writer. "JAMA says docs misled over industry ties." HoustonChronicle.com. July 18, 2006.
• Kurth, Tobias, MD, ScD; Gaziano, J. Michael, MD, MPH; Cook, Nancy R., ScD; Logroscino, Giancarlo, MD, PhD;Diener, Hans-Christoph, MD, PhD; Buring, Julie E., ScD. (2006) "Migraine and Risk of Cardiovascular Disease in Women." JAMA: The Journal of the American Medical Association. 2006;296:283-291.