Harvard Medical School in Ethics Quandary http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/03/business/03medschool.html?_r=1&hp Harvard Medical School To Meet To Address Conflict of Interest Policies http://www.kaisernetwork.org/daily_reports/rep_index.cfm?DR_ID=57259 Nonprofit hospitals targeted on leader pay http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2009/03/04/nonprofit_hospitals_targeted_on_leader_pay/ Med school pares rules on conflicts of interest http://www.startribune.com/business/40682112.html?elr=KArks:DCiU1OiP:DiiUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUU AMSA PharmFree [pdf] http://www.pharmfree.org/ Association of American Medical Colleges Research: Financial Conflicts of Interest in Academic Medicine [pdf, iTunes] http://www.aamc.org/research/coi/start.htm In recent years, universities and other institutions have struggled to define conflict of interest agreements and rules that govern the relationships between their employees and various corporations and other organizations. Faculty and staff members at many medical schools have come under close scrutiny, and some have questioned the large consulting fees that certain persons have received from pharmaceutical companies. This week the New York Times reported that a group of medical students at Harvard University called upon the administration to reexamine the school's conflict of interest policy. The group of students has already met with some success as they have secured a requirement that all professors and lecturers disclose their industry ties in class. David Tian, a first year student at Harvard's medical school commented, "Before coming here, I had no idea how much influence companies had on medical education." Harvard is not the only school looking into these matters, as other universities including the University of Minnesota Medical School have also been in the process of reevaluating their conflict of interest policies as of late. The first link will take users to a story on the subject from this Monday's New York Times. The second link leads to a piece from the Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report which offers additional perspectives on the issue, along with some links to several other relevant resources. The third link will whisk users away to a piece from this Wednesday's Boston Globe which reports that Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa will be taking on the task of looking into the salaries of those persons who lead nonprofit hospitals. Moving on, the fourth link leads to a news article from this Tuesday's Minneapolis Star-Tribune on the recent efforts to redraft the conflict of interest rules at the University of Minnesota Medical School. The fifth link will take visitors to the American Medical Students Association (AMSA) PharmFree website. Here visitors can learn about the Association's campaign to promote the "conscientious, explicit and judicious use of the current best evidence in clinical care", among other topics. The final link leads to the American Association of Medical Colleges (AAMC) page dedicated to providing information about industry funding of medical education, along with reports on individual financial conflicts of interest.