Embattled Emory psychiatrist steps down

The Emory psychiatry researcher who found himself in hot water over his income from Big Pharma has stepped down from his role as chair of his department. The job change comes after a university investigation; in a statement yesterday evening, Emory said the probe found more than $800,000 of income from GlaxoSmithKline that Charles Nemeroff (photo) failed to divulge. University policy requires faculty to disclose all speaking engagements and fees, an Emory spokesman told the Wall Street Journal.

The money came from more than 250 speaking engagements between January 2000 and January 2006. "I regret the failure of full disclosure on my part that has led to the current situation," Nemeroff said in a statement. But, he added that he thought he had been "acting in good faith to comply with the rules as I understood them to be in effect at the time."

For the next two years, Emory won't include Nemeroff as an investigator on any National Institutes of Health grants or contract requests. Nemeroff, however, will remain at the university as a professor.

As you know, the allegations of conflict of interest burst into the news after Sen. Charles Grassley wrote the university asking about Nemeroff's ties to the industry. The senator's investigation touched off the university probe. Later, the NIH suspended an Emory grant on the basis of the allegations.

- read the WSJ article
- see the post at Pharmalot

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