Conflicts of interest in biomedical research--the FASEB guidelines

The rise in academia-industry relationships has been accompanied by increasing concerns about financial conflicts of interest. To date, policy recommendations addressing financial conflicts of interest have focused on the role of academic institutions in reviewing and overseeing investigator relationships with industry. However, investigators as a group determine the effectiveness of policies and practices. Therefore, there is a clear need for a consensus statement of standards for academia-industry interactions from the scientists' perspective. To meet that need, we propose conflict of interest guidelines for individual biomedical investigators to address the critical challenges faced when financial relationships with industry exist.