Research presented at 2018 Digestive Disease Week, July 2 to July 5 in Washington, D.C., found authors of clinical practice guidelines for inflammatory bowel disease often have financial conflicts of interest, Gastroenterology & Endoscopy News reported.
Researchers examined whether eight IBD guidelines from gastroenterological organization in the U.S., Europe and Canada met conditions set by the Institute of Medicine for conflicts of interest, which includes that less than 50 percent of committee members in charge of the guidelines do not have any financial conflicts of interest. All committee chairs must be free of financial conflicts of interest.
Here are the key findings:
1. Researchers found only three of the eight IBD guidelines published by gastroenterological societies met the guidelines.
2. Guidelines from the American Gastroenterological Association and guidelines by the British Society of Gastroenterology met the IOM's conditions.
3. TCommittee chairs of the European Crohn’s and Colitis Organisation and the Canadian Association of Gastroenterology failed to meet the IOM's conditions.
4. The findings may reflect the close relationship IBD physicians have with biologics companies.
"IBD is a small world, and it’s natural for there to be some sort of an industry interaction with the physicians, " Samir Grover, MD, an assistant professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of Toronto in Canada told Gastroenterology & Endoscopy News. “It’s hard to find a committee chair, for example, with the knowledge with respect to those medications that would be able to indicate that they were completely devoid of a financial conflict of interest, the world being so small.”