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P.Mean >>
Category >> Fraud in research (created 2007-07-11).
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These pages discuss recent examples of fraudulent research, false allegations of fraud, and the research community's efforts to reduce or eliminate fraud. Articles are arranged by date with the most recent entries at the top. Also see Category: Conflict of interest and Category: Ethics in research. Other entries about fraud in research can be found in the fraud in research page at the StATS website.
2008
Ernhart CB, Scarr S, Geneson DF. On being a whistleblower: the Needleman case. Ethics Behav 1993: 3(1); 73-93. [Medline]
Scarr S, Ernhart CB. Blood lead levels, scientific misconduct and the Needleman case. 3. A reply from Scarr and Ernhart. Am J Public Health 1996: 86(1); 113-4; author reply 114-5. [Medline]
Dyer C. Bristol doctors found guilty of serious professional misconduct. British Medical Journal 1998: 316) 1924.
Committee on Publication Ethics. COPE. Accessed on 2003-11-10. www.publicationethics.org.uk/
Lichtenstein DR, Wolfe MM. COX-2-Selective NSAIDs: new and improved? Jama 2000: 284(10); 1297-9. [Medline]
Mathieu S, Boutron I, Moher D, Altman DG, Ravaud P. Comparison of Registered and Published Primary Outcomes in Randomized Controlled Trials. JAMA. 2009;302(9):977-984. Comment: Only the abstract is freely available today (September 3, 2009), but if the full article is consistent with the abstract, this is a very shocking finding. Most registered trials are ambiguous about the primary outcome measure, and many of the trials that are not show a major discrepancy between the primary outcome as reported in the publication versus the primary outcome specified in the registry. [Accessed September 3, 2009]. Available at: http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/302/9/977
De Mets DL. Distinctions between fraud, bias, errors, misunderstanding, and incompetence. Control Clin Trials 1997: 18(6); 637-50; discussion 661-6.
Chan A, Hrobjartsson A, Haahr MT, Gotzsche PC, Altman DG. Empirical Evidence for Selective Reporting of Outcomes in Randomized Trials: Comparison of Protocols to Published Articles. JAMA. 2004;291(20):2457-2465. [Accessed February 25, 2009]. Available at: http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/291/20/2457
Ferriman A. Consultant suspended for research fraud. Bmj 2000: 321(7274); 1429. [Medline] [Full text] [PDF]
Needleman HL, Gunnoe C, Leviton A, Reed R, Peresie H, Maher C, Barrett P. Deficits in psychologic and classroom performance of children with elevated dentine lead levels. N Engl J Med 1979: 300(13); 689-95. [Medline]
Richman VV, Richman A. Enhancing research integrity. CMAJ. 2007;177(4):375. Available at: http://www.cmaj.ca/cgi/content/full/177/4/375 [Accessed February 25, 2009]. Description: The authors suggest a decentralized approach to preventing research misconduct based on the U.S. Sarbanes-Oxley Act. This law was passed to prevent fraudulent accounting practices, but many of the provisions can be adapted to a research setting.
Needleman HL. Environmental lead and children's intelligence. BMJ 1995: 310(6991); 1408a-. [Medline] [Full text]
Pocock SJ, Smith M, Baghurst P. Environmental lead and children's intelligence: a systematic review of the epidemiological evidence. BMJ 1994: 309(6963); 1189-1197. [Medline] [Abstract] [Full text]
Daryl Cunningham. The Facts In The Case Of Dr. Andrew Wakefield. Excerpt: "A fifteen page story about the MMR vaccination controversy. As ever, I'm sure a few spelling errors have slipped past me. Feel free to point any out so I can correct them. I did a ton of research on this piece. When I've got an extra minute, I'm going to add on a list of references, with links. Now! Let's have a heated debate!" [Accessed February 24, 2011]. Available at: http://darryl-cunningham.blogspot.com/2010/05/facts-in-case-of-dr-andrew-wakefield.html.
Journal article: Elizabeth A Sweetman, Gordon S Doig. Failure to report protocol violations in clinical trials: A threat to internal validity? Trials. 2011;12(1):214. ABSTRACT: "BACKGROUND: Excessive protocol violations (PV), which can be defined as preventable mistakes in study conduct, may result in patient harm and introduce errors into a clinical trial's results leading to flawed trial conclusions. The purpose of this project was to gain a better understanding of reported PVs, to describe current practice with regards to the use of methods for the reduction of PVs and to investigate relationships between clinical trial characteristics and PVs. METHODS: We reviewed 80 clinical trials conducted across a broad range of medical specialties published in four major general medical journals (The Lancet, NEJM, JAMA, BMJ). Eligible papers were identified using a PubMed search. For each included trial, two authors independently abstracted information on trial characteristics, PV reporting and PV rates and interventions used to reduce PVs. PVs were categorised into one of five distinct types: enrolment, randomisation, study intervention, patient compliance and data collection errors. Associations between PVs and study characteristics were investigated using logistic regression. RESULTS: Eighty clinical trials (20 from each journal) were identified from 101 consecutive PubMed abstracts. The median number of participants was 701 (range: 20 to 162,367) and the median number of participating sites was 15 (range: 1 to 701). Nineteen percent (15/80) of included trials were single centre trials. The median study duration was 24 months (range: 5.81 - 127 months) and 74% (59/80) of included trials were primarily academic funded. Thirty two percent (26/80) of included trials failed to provide explicit reporting of any type of PV and none (0/80) of the trials provided explicit reporting of all five types of PVs. Larger clinical trials (more patients, more sites, longer duration, more complex management structure) were more likely to have more complete reporting of PV's. Only 9% (7/80) of trials reported the use of a specific study method to prevent PVs. Use of a run-in phase was the only method reported. CONCLUSIONS: PVs are under-reported. Although the CONSORT statement provides guidance on the reporting of PVs, reporting requirements are not explicit for all types of PVs. As a first step towards improved reporting by authors, we recommend the CONSORT statement highlight the importance of PVs by making reporting requirements more explicit." [Accessed on October 11, 2011].
Lei X, Chihua W. A farming family's recollection. Published in China Daily (September 25, 2003). Accessed on 2003-10-01. http://www1.chinadaily.com.cn/en/doc/2003-09/25/content_267233.htm
Silverstein FE, Faich G, Goldstein JL, Simon LS, Pincus T, Whelton A, Makuch R, Eisen G, Agrawal NM, Stenson WF, Burr AM, Zhao WW, Kent JD, Lefkowith JB, Verburg KM, Geis GS. Gastrointestinal toxicity with celecoxib vs nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs for osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis: the CLASS study: A randomized controlled trial. Celecoxib Long-term Arthritis Safety Study. Jama 2000: 284(10); 1247-55. [Medline]
Palca J. Get-the-lead-out guru challenged. Science 1991: 253(5022); 842-4. [Medline]
Dyer O. GlaxoSmithKline faces US lawsuit over concealment of trial results. Bmj 2004: 328(7453); 1395. [Medline] [Full text] [PDF]
Dyer O. GMC reprimands doctor for research fraud. BMJ 2003: 326(7392); 730a-. [Full text] [PDF]
Tuffs A. Haematologist may face disciplinary action for research fraud. BMJ 2001: 322(7288); 694c-. [Full text] [PDF]
Chan A, Altman DG. Identifying outcome reporting bias in randomised trials on PubMed: review of publications and survey of authors. BMJ. 2005;330(7494):753. Available at: http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/abstract/330/7494/753 [Accessed February 25, 2009].
Akhtar-Danesh N, Dehghan-Kooshkghazi M. How does correlation structure differ between real and fabricated data-sets? BMC Med Res Methodol 2003: 3(1); 18. [Medline] [Abstract] [Full text] [PDF]
Webpage: Wikipedia. John Darsee Excerpt: "John Darsee (born c. 1948, Huntington, West Virginia) was a medical researcher with an impressive list of publications in reputable scientific journals who was found to have fabricated data for his publications" [Accessed on November 16, 2011]. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Darsee.
Milloy S. Integrity in Science Award Is Neither. Fox News. Accessed on 2003-07-11. www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,91600,00.html
Section on Survey Research Methods. Interviewer Falsification in Survey Research [pdf]. Draft 3 published on April 21, 2003 by the American Statistical Association. Accessed on 2003-05-15. www.aapor.org/interviewfalse.pdf
Chan A, Krleza-Jeric K, Schmid I, Altman DG. Outcome reporting bias in randomized trials funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. CMAJ. 2004;171(7):735-740. Available at: http://www.cmaj.ca/cgi/content/abstract/171/7/735 [Accessed February 25, 2009].
Hirji K. No short-cut in assessing trial quality: a case study. Trials. 2009;10(1):1. Available at: http://www.trialsjournal.com/content/10/1/1 [Accessed February 23, 2009].
Needleman J, Buerhaus P, Mattke S, Stewart M, Zelevinsky K. Nurse-Staffing Levels and the Quality of Care in Hospitals. N Engl J Med 2002: 346(22); 1715-1722. [Abstract]
Bronson P, A Prayer Before Dying. Published in the December 2002 issue of Wired Magazine. Accessed on 2003-09-09. www.wired.com/wired/archive/10.12/prayer.html?pg=1
Stehman FB, Blessing JA, Fowler WC, Park RC. Quality assessment and assurance programs in the Gynecologic Oncology Group. Obstet Gynecol 1994: 84(6); 1059-62.
Montenegro R, Needleman I, Moles D, Tonetti M. Quality of RCTs in Periodontology-- A Systematic Review. J Dent Res 2002: 81(12); 866-870. [Abstract]
Bailar JC, 3rd, MacMahon B. Randomization in the Canadian National Breast Screening Study: a review for evidence of subversion. Cmaj 1997: 156(2); 193-9. [Medline] [Abstract] [PDF]
Needleman HL. Reply to Ernhart, Scarr, and Geneson. Ethics Behav 1993: 3(1); 95-101. [Medline]
Needleman HL. A reply to Scarr and Ernhart. Pediatrics 1993: 91(2); 519-21. [Medline]
Mann H. Research ethics committees and public dissemination of clinical trail results. The Lancet 2002: 360(9330); 406. [Medline]
Peter T Wilmshurst. Research misconduct: can Australia learn from he UK’s stuttering system? MJA 2007; 186 (12): 662-663. [Full text] [PDF]. Description: Allegations of fraud are always controversial and carry with them the threat of litigation. One article was removed from the BMJ website because of the threat of a lawsuit. It turns out that there is a one year statute of limitations, but that does not apply to a web publication because it is constantly being republished.
Lenzer J. Researcher to be sacked after reporting high rates of ADHD. Bmj 2005: 330(7493); 691. [Medline] [Full text] [PDF]
Gottlieb S. Researchers deny any attempt to mislead the public over JAMA article on arthritis drug. Bmj 2001: 323(7308); 301. [Medline] [Full text] [PDF]
Needleman HL. Salem comes to the National Institutes of Health: notes from inside the crucible of scientific integrity. Pediatrics 1992: 90(6); 977-81. [Medline]
Webpage: Wikipedia. Schön scandal Excerpt: "The Schön scandal concerns German physicist Jan Hendrik Schön (born 1970 in Verden) who briefly rose to prominence after a series of apparent breakthroughs with semiconductors that were later discovered to be fraudulent.[1] Before he was exposed, Schön had received the Otto-Klung-Weberbank Prize for Physics in 2001, the Braunschweig Prize in 2001 and the Outstanding Young Investigator Award of the Materials Research Society in 2002, which was later rescinded. The scandal provoked discussion in the scientific community about the degree of responsibility of coauthors and reviewers of scientific papers. The debate centered on whether peer review, traditionally designed to find errors and determine relevance and originality of papers, should also be required to detect deliberate fraud." [Accessed on November 16, 2011]. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sch%C3%B6n_scandal.
Webpage: Tim Beardsley. Scientific American: Profile: Thereza Imanishi-Kari: November 1996 Excerpt: "For someone whose lack of organization has become a topic of conversation throughout academe and beyond, Thereza Imanishi-Kari has a strikingly tidy office. The Brazilian-born scientist was this past summer cleared of all charges of scientific misconduct arising from a tangled, decade-old controversy that reached into the halls of Congress and forced Nobelist David Baltimore, one of Imanishi-Kari's co-authors in a disputed scientific study, to resign as president of the Rockefeller University. Because of his indignant defense of Imanishi-Kari, the case became known as the "Baltimore affair," even though she was the only one of six collaborators to be accused of wrongdoing. Intense news coverage turned the saga into the most sensational case of alleged research fraud in U.S. history: three books about it are now in progress. Recently reinstated as an assistant professor in the pathology department at the Tufts University School of Medicine, Imanishi-Kari, currently in her early fifties, seems remarkably unbitter. Casually dressed and in an ebullient mood in her small room at the top of a cramped laboratory building in the New England Medical Center, she displays no anger toward her accusers, concluding that they should look to their consciences: "We all have to live with our mistakes." She finds it "very sad," however, that some scientists, notably Mark Ptashne of Harvard University, publicly sided with her accusers without ever discussing the evidence with her." [Accessed on November 16, 2011]. http://www.gatewaycoalition.org/files/gateway_project_moshe_kam/resource/DBCre/imk.html.
Journal article: W P Whitely, D Rennie, A W Hafner. The scientific community's response to evidence of fraudulent publication. The Robert Slutsky case JAMA. 1994;272(2):170-173. Abstract: "OBJECTIVE: To determine whether scientists can detect fraudulent results in published research articles and to identify corrective measures that are most effective in purging fraudulent results from the literature. DESIGN: Retrospective case-control study comparing articles by an author known to have published fraudulent articles, Robert A. Slutsky, MD, to a set of control articles. The number of non-self-citations received by each article during each calendar year (1979 through 1990) was counted. The citation numbers were transformed into scores. Each Slutsky article was assigned a score between 1 and 3 based on the number of citations received by the Slutsky article and each of its assigned control articles. Average citation numbers and scores were tracked for each year during the 11-year study period. RESULTS: Before Slutsky's work was publicly questioned (1975 to 1985), scientists cited his articles as frequently as they cited control articles. After Slutsky's work was questioned and reports were published in the news media (1985), scientists cited his article less frequently than they cited control articles. Citations decreased further after the University of California-San Diego published a review of the validity of Slutsky's work in 1987. Citations did not decrease after the appearance of retractions in print or in MEDLINE. CONCLUSION: Scientists do not, and probably cannot, identify published articles that are fraudulent. However, when alerted to the presence of fraudulent results in the literature, the scientific community responds by reducing the number of citations of the tainted articles. In the Slutsky case, general news articles and the three reviews published by the University of California-San Diego were most effective and retractions were least effective in purging fraudulent results from the literature." [Accessed on November 16, 2011]. Available at http://www.ama-assn.org/public/peer/7_13_94/pv3111x.htm
Aubrey Blumsohn. Scientific Misconduct Blog Description: This site provides ongoing discussion of scientific misconduct with an emphasis on pharmaceutical firms. This website was last verified on 2007-07-11. URL: scientific-misconduct.blogspot.com/
DeMets DL. Statistics and ethics in medical research. Sci Eng Ethics 1999: 5(1); 97-117. [Medline]
Abelson RP. Statistics as Principled Argument. (1995) Hillsdale, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. ISBN: 0805805281. [BookFinder4U link]
Skolnick AA. Surf's up for health fraud investigators [news]. Jama 1997: 278(21); 1725. [Medline]
Journal article: Jennifer Couzin. Truth and Consequences Science. 2006;313(5791):1222 -1226. Excerpt: "Although the university handled the case by the book, the graduate students caught in the middle have found that for all the talk about honesty's place in science, little good has come to them. Three of the students, who had invested a combined 16 years in obtaining their Ph.D.s, have quit school. Two others are starting over, one moving to a lab at the University of Colorado, extending the amount of time it will take them to get their doctorates by years. The five graduate students who spoke with Science also described discouraging encounters with other faculty members, whom they say sided with Goodwin before all the facts became available. " [Accessed on November 16, 2011]. Available at http://www.sciencemag.org/content/313/5791/1222.short
Chalmers I. Underreporting research is scientific misconduct. Jama 1990: 263(10); 1405-8. [Medline]
Newspaper article: Jeneen Interlandi. An Unwelcome Discovery The New York Times. 2006. [Accessed on November 16, 2011]. http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/22/magazine/22sciencefraud.html.
Dobson R. US research scientist found guilty of fraud. Bmj 1999: 319(7218); 1156A. [Medline] [Full text] [PDF]
Scarr S, Ernhart CB. Of whistleblowers, investigators, and judges. Ethics Behav 1993: 3(2); 199-206. [Medline]
All of the material above this paragraph is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License. This page was written by
Steve Simon and was last modified on
2010-04-11. The material
below this paragraph links to my
old website, StATS. Although I wrote all of the material
listed below, my ex-employer, Children's Mercy Hospital, has claimed copyright
ownership of this material. The brief excerpts shown here are included under
the fair use provisions of U.S. Copyright laws.
2008
Stats: Why we need case studies of research ethics in graphic novel format (April 3, 2008). I was asked to provide some justification for a project I am working on, case studies in research ethics using a graphic novel format. Here is what I wrote.
Stats: Illustrated case studies of research ethics and research fraud (June 11, 2007). I've written a fair number of case studies involving research ethics and research fraud for the Chance Wiki. I want to take some of this material and produce some web pages with nice illustrations that will bring these cases to life and make them more memorable. This may eventually lead to a book, but that is quite a way down the road.
Stats: Manipulation of peer-review publications by pharmaceutical companies (November 21, 2006). I volunteered to give a talk at a local hospital, and the topic I'd like to discuss is "Manipulation of peer-review publications by pharmaceutical companies." It would cover some of the same material that was highlighted in Richard Smith's article in the Public Library of Science "Medical Journals Are an Extension of the Marketing Arm of Pharmaceutical Companies."
Stats: I wasn't making up data, I was imputing! (October 25, 2006). The New York Times has an informative summary of a recent research scandal involving a prominent researcher at the University of Vermont, Eric Poehlman. The Poehlman scandal represents perhaps the biggest cases of research fraud in recent history.
Stats: Fraudulent images in research (July 12, 2006). Fraud in research is a big problem. One issue that has come up recently is that graphical images can be "Photoshopped" to present the image in a way that does not truly represent how the original research was done. Photoshop is a very useful program that can enhance images, but it must be used very carefully and with very limited objectives There are some recently published guidelines that are worth keeping in mind.
Stats: Using a charge of fraud to achieve a political end (June 23, 2006). There was an interesting paper published recently: The 1996 Continuous Negative Extrathoracic Pressure (CNEP) trial: were parents' allegations of research fraud fraudulent? E. Hey. Pediatrics 2006: 117(6); 2244-6. The author describe a researcher who was subjected to charges of research fraud. Perhaps, though, the charges of fraud are themselves fraudulent. The motivation, the author suggests, may not have been the research itself but some additional controversial activities that the researchers were involved with.
Stats: The fate of retracted articles (October 14, 2005). A member of the Evidence Based Health email discussion group noted an interesting discussion about a recently retracted Cochrane review: "Is CybermedicineKilling You?"--The story of a Cochrane disaster. Eysenbach G, Kummervold PE. J Med Internet Res 2005: 7(2); e21. It turns out that most journals do not have a clear written policy on publishing retractions.
Stats: Dishonesty in medical research (September 15, 2005). Roy Poses, a regular contributor to the email discussion group Evidence Based Health wrote a provocative email pointing out the manipulation of research, ghost-writing, and suppression of research that is being done to support the marketing of unsafe and/or ineffective drugs.
Stats: Allegations of scientific misconduct (August 1, 2005). A recent email in the IRBForum highlight allegations of scientific misconduct and cites a news report in BMJ, Researcher to be sacked after reporting high rates of ADHD. Lenzer J. Bmj 2005: 330(7493); 691. This report describes, Dr. Gretchen LeFever, a researcher at East Virginia Medical School, who is being fired. Dr. LeFever has published controversial research on the prevalence of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) disorders in children. The article describes an allegation that may have lead to her firing.
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