From Seth's Blog (via UD)

Academic Horror Story (Emory University)

From Claudia Adkinson, Emory University dean, to Charles Nemeroff, Emory University professor of psychiatry, in a 2006 memo:

I have been grateful that the reporter was not sophisticated enough to ask all the right questions.

Grateful. She was grateful. Ugh. Double ugh. Professor Nemeroff, you’ll recall, took vast sums of money to advocate the prescription of dangerous drugs to millions of people and hid this fact, even after several warnings. Dean Adkinson was grateful, let me repeat, that a reporter didn’t ask “all the right questions” to expose this.

This is why New York Times reporter John Schwartz’s lack of understanding matters.

Fairview Health Services is cutting 150 to 200 filled positions, not including positions it will leave open, spokesman Ryan Davenport said. The health system also will delay some capital projects — though not the ongoing construction of a pediatric hospital — and improve the efficiency of its staffing, supply chain and billing.

An Oct. 2 memo from Fairview executives noted that their flagship hospital — the University of Minnesota Medical Center — isn't running as efficiently as other teaching hospitals.

"We have benchmarked both clinical and non-clinical areas against the nation's academic health care organizations (600+ beds, 200 transplants) and found we use more resources to do our work than other organizations," the memo said.

Her latest post concerns the continuing firestorm over doctors on the dole. Perhaps our administration could learn something about the need to stop doing business as usual? Perhaps we could speed up action here at the U about conflict of interest?

From MPR: "The recommendations have been emailed to members of the university's medical school community along with a request for input. University of Minnesota medical school leaders say they don't have a timeline to act on the recommendations, but would like to see some action taken in the next year."

From UD:

Emory University, his employer, has known for years he’s a greedy son of a bitch who doesn’t think rules apply to him, and it’s done nothing. It shares Nemeroff’s cynicism, enjoying as much as he does the corrupting pharma money the psychiatric researcher brings the school.

No conflict of interest here, in other words: It’s in Nemeroff’s interest to get rich, and it’s in Emory’s interest to get rich.

The field of academic psychiatry is filthy all the way through right now, with Nemeroff and his crony, Alan Schatzberg, heading it, setting an example, showing everyone the way.

Supine universities, a nation of pill poppers… the world is their oyster.

The journalists should certainly interview as many professors as they can in the department Nemeroff chaired, psychiatry and behavioral sciences. They need to ask these people why none of them ever expressed any reservations about a chair whose behavior was a well-established scandal. Perhaps their silence means that they, taking their cue from their leader, also make conflict of interest the basis of their professional lives. If the behavior’s endemic in the department, the journalists need to ask the administration why the university’s conflict of interest procedures are total shit.

By GARDINER HARRIS
Published: October 3, 200

One of the nation’s most influential psychiatrists earned more than $2.8 million in consulting arrangements with drug makers from 2000 to 2007, failed to report at least $1.2 million of that income to his university and violated federal research rules, according to documents provided to Congressional investigators.

The psychiatrist, Dr. Charles B. Nemeroff of Emory University, is the most prominent figure to date in a series of disclosures that is shaking the world of academic medicine and seems likely to force broad changes in the relationships between doctors and drug makers.

The findings suggest that universities are all but incapable of policing their faculty’s conflicts of interest. Almost every major medical school and medical society is now reassessing its relationships with drug and device makers.

As revelations from Mr. Grassley’s investigation have dribbled out, trade organizations for the pharmaceutical industry and medical colleges have agreed to support the bill. Eli Lilly and Merck have announced that they would list doctor payments next year even without legislation.

Universities once looked askance at professors who consulted for more than one or two drug companies, but that changed after a 1980 law gave the universities ownership of patents discovered with federal money.

The law helped give birth to the biotechnology industry and led to the discovery of dozens of life-saving medicines. Consulting arrangements soon proliferated at medical schools, and Dr. Nemeroff — who at one point consulted for 21 drug and device companies simultaneously — became a national model.

He may now become a model for a broad reassessment of industry relationships. Many medical schools, societies and groups are considering barring doctors from giving lectures on drug or device marketing.

Or, in the words of OurLeader:

"I think we need to put ourselves in the position of acting according to the highest ethical principles. I believe our people do that now and I believe our people will be doing that in the future as well." President Bruininks (Daily: 6-18-08)

I wonder where - and have asked - the new proposal places us on the Student American Medical Association scorecard where we received a D for the current situation at the medical school?

Yesterday I put up a post that was taken pretty much from an MPR report.

Regulating Doctors on the Dole at the University of Minnesota?

Eventually....

To my great surprise, this post received a large amount of traffic - about 400 hits. My blogs are generally pretty low traffic, 100 hits is a good day, so this was quite a surprise.

Turned out that the traffic was due to the site of cursor.org, wherein a link was embedded in the following paragraph:

"If we went out on the street and told people some of what went on, they would be shocked," says a journalism professor who describes himself as "the most outside outsider" on a University of Minnesota medical school conflict of interest task force.

-------------------

More on all of this later. Bill Gleason

Fighting rising tuition and student debt

If University President Bob Bruininks and the Board of Regents are serious about reaching any top three goals, they need to put the interest of students first. But by increasing tuition of both undergraduate and graduate students, University officials are effectively increasing the debt of each. The high tuition rates and average debt could potentially scare away talented students to schools more accommodating to their financial needs.

The average student debt of a University graduate is $24,995, the worst in the Big Ten among public universities. Illinois has the lowest debt at $15,413.

How about it Bob and Tom? Don't you think it's time to discuss this very important matter?

(from the Daily)

“We haven’t been controlling our economy very efficiently,” he said. “I just think we’re headed for a difficult situation.”

Bruininks explained the value of the University and why it should be invested in.

“The history of this University is very much the history of this state,” he said. “I don’t think anybody should put a dime into the University of Minnesota unless we use the money well, we invest it well and that we’re efficient in how we use resources.”

Trees don't grow to the sky, Bob. In times of financial stress, the value of prudent leadership becomes even more apparent. This is hardly the time to be making noises about "ambitious aspirations" or trying to solve our problems by hiring very expensive outsiders who are going to ride in on a white horse and save us.

Do we really need to spend another half mil to advertise the football stadium?

How much has already been spent on the money sink that is MoreU park?

How much money is going to be required to pay the University's share of the four new biomedical research buildings? And to fund new faculty and equipment to make them functional? And where is this money to come from, Bob?

It is time to focus on what should be the number one priority at our land grant university, the education of students - both undergraduate and graduate students.

Misuse of University funds

Editorial 09/25/2008

The Minnesota Daily reported Monday that the new advertising campaign for the stadium was paid for with $460,000 from the central University budget.

This year, the University subsidized $4.9 million out of a $69.2 million budget for the athletics department, which University officials say have a goal of becoming fiscally independent. The Daily reported the new ad campaign is expected to boost fundraising for the new stadium and ticket sales, and the University has to raise $86 million for the new stadium. But it is still roughly $10 million short.

The University, nevertheless, has plenty of expenses on its plate, and if there’s excess in the budget, the first place that excess should go is into the pockets of students — not toward an athletics department.

Indeed, 2009 is a budget year for the state, and President Bruininks could have a hard time explaining to state legislatures that his budget request is “modest.” Especially when the University is doling out funds for an advertising campaign for a new stadium that anyone in Minnesota would have trouble not hearing about. Furthermore, it seems like an odd use of funds, considering that Bruininks told The Daily that asking the state to provide an investment “will be a challenge this year in the midst of this global or national recession.”

The University must remain cognizant of its responsibility as a land grant institution to prioritize education. Hundreds of thousands of dollars toward shiny new billboards for a department with an annual budget of at least $69 million is a waste in the face of $10,000 tuition, especially with 4.5 percent increases on the horizon. We hope the Board of Regents takes a careful look at the budget request in its October meeting.

The following piece, in a slightly shorter form, has appeared in the Minnesota Daily:

"The time has come," the Walrus said, "To talk of many things: Of shoes—and ships—and sealing-wax— And cabbages—and kings—“

Another great summer has passed. The campus was surprisingly alive with students - some taking classes, some doing research, and some being introduced to the U through various summer programs. The students certainly aren't the problem here.

The tail end of the summer was a little disheartening though. We were humilated in the new Forbes ratings (524th !), but showed slight improvement in the US News beauty contest (61st) – leaving us still last in our self-selected peer cohort and in the bottom half of the BigTen. We are now four years from the beginning of our campaign to greatness, in another year we should be half way there.

Are we?

This is being written on the last Friday in August and I was away earlier in the week 'Up North in God's Country, aka the Norwegian Riviera, at Naniboujou above Grand Marais. There were no tvs, no newspapers, no email, no internet. This was a chance to think about where we are and where we'd like to be both personally and at the U.

Margaret Soltan, an English prof at George Washington, writes the premiere academic blog in the US, University Diaries (UD). One of her favorite targets is the excesses of football at the expense of academics, and we have become one of her favorite targets. It was on the UD site that I first learned of the latest troubles at the football factory. Evidently, we have made our academic standards even lower in our latest recruiting efforts.

I believe that our current football troubles and most of our other problems are directly linked to the top three goal. President Bruininks has touted ambitious aspirations in an embarrassingly titled document: "Serving Minnesota Through World-Class Greatness.”

"Starting in 2004...Under the leadership of Provost Sullivan, the University community articulated an ambitious aspiration for the University—to be one of the top three public research universities in the world [sic] within a decade."

Today's piece is not meant to be argumentative but to stimulate the initiation of a campus wide discussion of where we are as a university and where we would like to go as a community. I am very disappointed that the establishment of a blog for this purpose [“Conversations with the Provost”], promised last year by provost Sullivan, was dropped because of lack of time on his part. Certainly time spent on such a campus-wide discussion is worth more than that spent on yet another legal tome or further resume-building conferences?

Let all of us, students, faculty, staff, and administrators, work hard to make the U an institution of which we can be proud. People need to have input and they should have some tangible evidence that their input has been heard and acted upon and not just used as evidence that they have been consulted. The administration needs to stop calling people who disagree with them “doubters.” We have just as much at stake as they do, perhaps more.

In the words of Mark Yudof:

To the best of my recollection, no great scientific discoveries, no insightful social science tracts, and no novels have been produced in Morrill Hall. No classes are taught in Morrill Hall. No patients are made well in Morrill Hall. Help, or get out of the way! Without authority invested where the real work of this University is done, the light of excellence will only grow dimmer. University administrators have not yet cornered the market in acumen and foresight; a monologue will not suffice.

I ask that you respond with a piece on the top three goal and that we continue a public dialog throughout this academic year so that communication about important issues does not continue to be a monologue.

Examples of other important topics include the money sink that is UMore Park, ethical behavior at the university, student debt upon graduation, relations with our outstanding coordinate campuses, and the land grant mission of the university. But the place to start discussion is the top three goal, because its pursuit precludes the solution of more important current problems.

I look forward to your response and the initiation of a true conversation this year.

Bill Gleason is a medical school faculty member and U of M alum (PhD, chemistry, 1973) who has taught at Carleton and St. Catherine. Prior to returning to the U in 1989 he worked nine years as a research chemist at 3M. He writes a blog entitled The Periodic Table, described as: "Periodic submissions related to chemistry, education, research, academic life at BigU, and anything else of interest to Mr. Bonzo (aka the Whining Dinosaur)."

A while back, the bimbo of the month, Paris Hilton, had her cell phone account hacked by what has come to be known as the Tinkerbell hack. Tinkerbell is the name of her obnoxious dog.

The idea is that you can get into an account if you know the answer to some question, should you forget your password. There are variations of this. Apparently Governor Palin had her email account hacked by someone who got personal information about her that is public information, possibly through Wikipedia. A currently popular guess is that she used her Wasilla zip code.

So the moral of the story is: Don't use a question whose answer can be readily found. It might be best to use some nonsense word that you can remember. (I know this is a pain and the older I get the harder it is to remember this stuff. But the consequences - to Ms. Palin and PH - should be instructive.)

Please don't be insulted. I know that no one here at the U would do something so stupid. But maybe, somewhere, some governor will read this.

Oh, and if a governor should happen to read this: It is also not a good idea to conduct government business on a Yahoo account.

Put McGuire's academic gown on hold

By Lori Sturdevant

Last update: September 15, 2008 - 3:46 PM

Former UnitedHealth Group CEO William McGuire apparently won't be prepping for class lectures at the University of MInnesota anytime soon. Word last week that he was being considered for "executive in residence" status at the Carlson School of Management was countered Monday by a denial from the university.

The university statement, from spokesman Daniel Wolter, said that McGuire "was working with a leading faculty member in the Carlson School on an academic paper. There were no discussions of his joining the university in any other capacity."

A spokesman for McGuire, Bob Chlopak, said that any discussion of a permanent role at the Carlson School "was a surprise" to McGuire.

Whether it was sent aloft intentionally or unintentionally by the Carlson School, the McGuire trial balloon dropped like a stone -- and for good reason. McGuire is not yet out of the ethical and legal thicket that the alleged backdating of stock options put him in at UnitedHealth. He has already paid legal judgments and fines of $37 million in the matter, and has relinquished a total of $618 million in options since leaving UnitedHealth in 2006. What he has not done is admitted to any wrongdoing.

And so was the statement, made earlier in the Strib, true, Mr. Wolter?

Stephen Parente, director of the Medical Industry Leadership Institute in the Carlson School of Management, said the school had given him the go-ahead to explore the idea with McGuire, former chief executive of Minnetonka-based UnitedHealth Group.

There was some discussion within the school, Parente said, on whether it was appropriate to engage McGuire, given the lawsuits and investigations in which he was embroiled. The conclusion was that it was.

From the Star-Tribune, Monday, September 15:

I was astounded to read in the Star Tribune that the University of Minnesota is courting William McGuire for the position of "executive in residence" at its school of business (Business, Sept. 12).

Yes, the same William McGuire who has become the symbol of corporate greed in Minnesota and nationwide, a billionaire CEO who was forced to relinquish his position at UnitedHealth Group because of a highly publicized options backdating scandal. In justifying the university's courtship of McGuire,

Medical Industry Leadership Institute Director Stephen Parente was quoted as saying "We don't really care about the stock options." Apparently the university is prepared to make McGuire a role model for future business leaders. It's difficult to not draw a parallel to some of the "role models" that have been recruited into the university's sports programs, and into professional sports in general.

While university leaders may consider it a creative coup to add McGuire to its staff, the average citizen will see it differently.

WES MADER, PRIOR LAKE

Here's an example of one of our competitor's walking the talk, Bob. Note - these students will not be in debt when they graduate. Hint: Maybe it is time for you to go and do likewise?

Purdue Promise:

The Purdue Promise ensures a Purdue education to Indiana students whose families earn $40,000 or less and who meet the requirements of the Twenty-First Century Scholars Program.

Purdue will provide a combination of grant aid and work-study funding that will meet financial need for four years; these students will not have to take out loans to earn a bachelor's degree.

These students also will benefit from academic and social support programs designed specifically for Purdue Promise scholars. The first recipients will start class in fall 2009.

About 200 students a year will be enrolled, and by 2013 Horne said she expects that 880 students on campus will be part of this program.