Harvard med students just say no

Brandishing signs on the steps of Harvard Medical School’s Gordon Hall, about 40 students flanked by colleagues from Tufts and Boston University rallied for stronger policies against pharmaceutical-industry influence at Harvard’s affiliated hospitals last month.

A petition signed by over 200 faculty and students was delivered to the office of Medical School Dean Jeffrey S. Flier, who was traveling at the time.

The event drew the attention of representatives from the pharmaceutical company Pfizer and former New England Journal of Medicine editor Arnold S. Relman, a Medical School professor who extemporaneously addressed the group.

Students at the Medical School said that they have been nudging the administration to revamp the school’s conflict of interest policies both in the classroom and at the affiliated hospitals for roughly six years to little or no avail. Students spend their third and fourth years at the affiliated hospitals for their clinical education training. “We really view this issue as something that is key to the integrity of medical education at Harvard,” said David C. Tian, a first-year student who recently pushed the administration to adopt a policy addition mandating that faculty and students disclose financial ties to pharmaceutical companies when discussing drugs developed by those companies in the classroom. “Starting with our third year, our teachers are the doctors who are interacting with industry on a daily basis in ways that the Medical School currently doesn’t standardize or set standards for,” Tian added.

Gretchen A. Brodnicki, the dean for faculty and research integrity, said that the administration is taking the student concerns seriously. She noted that Flier, who took the helm of the school in July 2007, convened a town hall meeting two weeks ago during which he addressed these concerns.

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