Drug company sponsorship of
educational programs for doctors will come under direct
scrutiny from GPs themselves when a key Royal Australian
College of General Practitioners (RACGP) committee meets
in May.
Chair of the RACGP’s QA&CPD sub-committee, Dr Peter
Maguire, confirmed the college would investigate
allegations that third party education providers'' choice
of speakers had been influenced by sponsors.
Drug promotion opponent, Ray Moynihan, has claimed that
sponsors’ suggestions regarding what speakers and topics
should be used at educational events have been “at times
enthusiastically embraced” by third party CPD providers.
"Our policies are quite clear; the content of educational
activities accredited by the college has to be free of
sponsorship influence.
"We are happy with the wording of these statements so
there won’t be any changes there, but we will look at the
issue of management and address any problems [associated
with] this," Dr Maguire said.
Although he backed the current system of company
sponsorship, saying blanket removal of sponsored events
from the QA program was unlikely at this point – “that
would be a huge change and would significantly restrict
the availability of education for GPs” – Dr Maguire said
the RACGP would look at alternative suggestions.
"Just as drug company sponsorship is declared in journal
articles, maybe when there is an event where the speaker
is chosen by the sponsor, we need to ensure the
participants are fully aware of this and so they can
decide whether they want [to attend] or not.
"Generally speaking we believe the providers do a good
job, but as the issue has been raised, we need to look at
it," he said.
Kate Woods |
