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Conflict of Interest Policy for Board Members

A main objective or purpose of Pharmacology Weekly is to provide health care providers who are either still in training or already licensed with unbiased answers to clinically relevant patient care questions. In order to do this appropriately, the CEO/President and Editor-in-Chief for Pharmacology Weekly have proactively put measures in place to protect the consumer from potential bias of the authors and reviewers of our published newsletters. This policy serves as the framework in providing the CEO/President, Editor-in-Chief, and Board Members with a systematic approach for addressing issues related to conflicts-of-interests as they arise.

The CEO/President, Editor-in-Chief, and appointed Board Members have all signed agreements that they comply with this policy as defined in the following sections.

Definition of Reportable Conflicts-of-Interest:

"Reportable Conflicts-of-Interest" include financial relationships with companies/organizations who provide health care products or services that exceed $1000 per year, i.e., in the form of stocks, honorariums for speakers bureaus, consulting fees, royalties, equity, funding for research, ("Financial Relationships"), uncompensated positions of influence held within an organization providing health care products or services, memberships of other editorial boards for medical related information that either competes with or would be considered a conflict to the services of Pharmacology Weekly, and leadership positions in an organization that either competes or would be considered a conflict to the services of Pharmacology Weekly.

Internal Disclosure

The CEO/President, Editor-in-Chief and Board Members will report all of their Reportable Conflicts-of-Interest on a yearly basis using a standardized form provided by Pharmacology Weekly, and they must further indicate which of those relationships exceed $10,000 and should be prepared to provide details of such arrangements upon request. This obligation shall also include the obligation to report any Reportable Conflicts-of-Interest that such persons' spouses or dependent children have that might be reasonably seen as a conflict of interest by an independent third party. If outside or invited authors are used for any material, then that person will also have to disclose any of the above Reportable Conflits-of-Interest that would compromise the objectivity and scientific rigor of the content being provided/published. These disclosure forms will be stored at the CEO/President's principal office and made available upon request where relevant or when appropriate only to the Editor-in-Chief and Pharmacology Weekly's legal counsel, with a continued obligation to hold such disclosures in the strictest confidence. Disclosure information for the CEO/President and Editor-in-Chief will also be made available, to be held in the strictest confidence, to the Board Members. Furthermore, all Board Members, authors, and editors of Pharmacology Weekly must disclose to the Editor-in-Chief (and in the case of the Editor-in-Chief, he shall disclose to the CEO/President) if he/she is currently employed with or has accepted a position for future employment with a manufacturer or distributor of pharmaceuticals, and such person shall thereafter no longer serve on the Editorial Board, as an author or editor, or otherwise for Pharmacology Weekly.

External Disclosure to the Public

This entire policy is being made available on the website for the public to review. General disclosures for the individual Board Members are available online - for more information click here. All Financial Relationships will be disclosed; however, no information about the amounts of any Financial Relationships will be disclosed, nor will disclosure on the website extend to information about spouses or dependent children. If any Board Member, reviewer or outside invited author has a Reportable Conflict-of-Interest to a specific newsletter, then he/she will offer to recuse him/herself from that particular project. Regardless of whether such author has offered to so recuse him/herself, the Editor-in-Chief will decide whether the author should proceed and, if so, what to disclose in the published work about the conflict. If the Editor-in-Chief should allow an author (either a member of the editorial board or an outside author) to write an article despite having a significant conflict, disclosure of such conflict will be included in the published or released material.

In addition, all material used in the writing of the newsletters will be appropriately referenced at the end of the newsletter. When available all references will be appropriately linked to the original source. Pharmacology Weekly, Inc. will make every effort to only use un-biased, peer-reviewed, published primary literature sources when available. Pharmacology, Inc., is not responsible for the disclosure policies of the primary sources used.

Disclosure of Website Sponsorship & Funding Sources

Currently, Pharmacology Weekly, Inc., does not advertise or accept sponsorship of published newsletters and materials, so that it may facilitate complete transparency and objectivity of information being provided to the reader. Pharmacology Weekly, Inc. may receive requests from outside entities for future newsletters or materials to address certain topics, but the actual publication of such requests will be at the complete discretion of the Editorial Board and will be done without direct sponsorship by the referring outside entity. Lastly, Pharmacology Weekly is not involved in co-branding of any health content or services.

Pharmacology Weekly, Inc. is funded by the owners of the company and through customers purchasing subscriptions or other related services offered by the company. No outside funding, grants, or sponsorship (including from government agencies, pharmaceutical companies or other commercial entities) is received for the services being provided by Pharmacology Weekly, Inc.

Changes or Additions to this Policy

The CEO/President and Editor-in-Chief, in consultation with the Editorial Board, will be the only individual(s) that have the ability to implement changes or additional policies pertaining to conflicts-of-interests as long as they are immediately made available to the public on-line through the website.

(Last updated: 2/9/2009)