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Published online 14 August 2008 | Nature | doi:10.1038/454922a
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Report finds grave flaws in urology trial
Scandal erupts at Austrian medical school.
A clinical trial of a stem-cell procedure for urinary incontinence by urologists at the Medical University of Innsbruck, Austria, was full of serious procedural and ethical problems, finds a report by the government's Agency for Health and Food Safety.
The study by Hannes Strasser and his colleagues, to determine the experimental therapy's efficacy, was published last year ("H.
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The urge to convert all science to material profit is a scourge that is rapidly affecting medicine. Whether pharmaceutical or other, every new development attracts investor attention, and it is soon the investor and not the investigator who seems to direct the course scientific endeavour should take. This has profound implications for academicians and, more importantly, patients. The implied trust in the physician-patient relationship is under great stress as a result. The price paid for such misadventures in resource-poor societies is even higher, but rarely attracts attention. This expose should be investigated professionally, too. More importantly any investigation should include investigation and exposure of the funding trail that drives such acts.
Despite of all ethical commities, moral code of conducts, "good scientific practices"such reports are pouring in ,interestingly from "resource rich societies"as well.One wonders wether we as scientific community have right prism to look in to the real culprit behind..material profit,publish or perish mantra..the funding jargon...(GHOST!),low moral standards....relative morality?? OR WHAT !unless the CAUSE is identified CURE will be just like a MIRAGE!We will run for one only to find ourselves in search of yet another.
This is typical for Austria and Germany. Internally the professors demand to be listed as authors of every paper published in their department. As a consequence they get honored in many ways and invitated by politicians and as speakers. If a problem happens they claim that this is an honorary authorship and should not have any consequences. The same happens with reimbursement. The Assistant has to evaluate the privately insured patient, he also performs the procedure (e.g. colonoscopy) and takes the risk of legal actions against him in case of complications and the professor pockets the money. Unbelievable but true.
Should authorship be given on the base of "respecting" seniority? Should condemnation be removed from an honorary author just because s/he later claimed lack of any knowledge even though s/he signed as one of the authors who did "all investigations and treatments"? Should an author be allowed to withdraw his/her name after the paper become problematic? Too many "honorary" authors but too little care for honoring science is a major problem in today's scientific world. ////Shi V. Liu (SVL@logibio.com; http://im1.biz; http://blog.sina.com.cn/im1)
We definitely need a more fundamental revolution in scientific publishing and a global platform to study scientific ethics. Please read "The Declaration of Revolution: The Want, Will, and Hopes of the Truth-Finding Scientists" at http://im1.biz/albums/userpics/10001/TFCP_Declaration_20070315.htm, many articles in Scientific Ethics (http://im1.biz) and some examples at http://im1.biz/Named.htm------Shi V. Liu (SVL@logibio.com; http://im1.biz; http://blog.sina.com.cn/im1)