Duke University School of Medicine has suspended a researcher and stopped patient enrollment in three cancer studies upon learning of reports that the researcher had overstated his academic credentials.
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- Duke Scientist Suspended Over Rhodes Scholar Claims
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/21/health/research/21cancer.html?_r=1
New York Time
Duke Scientist Suspended Over Rhodes Scholar Claims
By NATASHA SINGER
Published: July 20, 2010
Duke Photography
Dr. Anil Potti, a cancer researcher, is accused of lying about being a Rhodes scholar.
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One of the lead investigators on the cancer studies, Dr. Anil Potti, was placed on administrative leave, said Douglas J. Stokke, a spokesman for Duke, while the university investigates allegations that Dr. Potti had falsely claimed that he was a Rhodes scholar.
The controversy erupted late last week after an article published in The Cancer Letter, a weekly publication for cancer specialists, reported that Dr. Potti, an assistant professor of medicine, had on occasion exaggerated his credentials. (A spokeswoman at Rhodes House at Oxford confirmed on Tuesday that Dr. Potti had not received the scholarship.)
When questions about Dr. Potti’s credentials became public, the American Cancer Society suspended payments of a five-year, $729,000 grant awarded to Dr. Potti to study the genetics of lung cancer. The society awarded the grant based in part on a résumé from the doctor that included the Rhodes honor, said Dr. Otis W. Brawley, the chief medical officer of the cancer society.
Dr. Potti did not respond to an e-mail message seeking comment.
In addition, several dozen biostatisticians and cancer researchers at Harvard, Princeton, Johns Hopkins and other academic institutions are now questioning the methodology behind the three clinical trials, urging a halt to the Duke studies — two on lung cancer and one on breast cancer — in a letter sent to the director of the National Cancer Institute.
The suspension of new patient enrollment in the three cancer studies at Duke comes just after Columbia said it was suspending research at a brain-imaging center there. Columbia halted its research after investigators from the Food and Drug Administration found that the center had routinely injected mental patients with drugs that contained impurities, an article in The New York Times reported last week.
The situation at Duke is different, however, because there are no allegations that patients were given deficient drugs. Dr. Potti had been featured in several promotional videos about research at Duke.
His research involves a prediction model in which genetic analysis is used to determine which chemotherapy drugs would work best for particular cancer patients. Dr. Potti and Dr. Joseph R. Nevins, a professor in molecular genetics at Duke medical school, developed the prediction model.
Some experts at other medical centers said they had been initially excited about the Duke researchers’ prediction model. Using that proposed system, a doctor should be able to examine tissue from a lung tumor, for example, assess the activity level of certain genes, and then choose the most appropriate treatment among a few standard chemotherapy drugs for a patient.
But the Duke researchers’ data analysis, published in influential medical journals like The New England Journal of Medicine and Nature Medicine, has come under increasing scrutiny by some outside experts.
Last year, two biostatisticians at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center published an article in the scientific journal Annals of Applied Statistics in which they identified errors in Duke’s data analysis and said they had not been able to reproduce Duke’s results.
“This list of errors is sufficiently long that we actually think this doesn’t work, and we told them that,” said Keith A. Baggerly, a co-author of that article and an associate professor of bioinformatics and computational biology at MD Anderson.
In this week’s letter to Dr. Harold E. Varmus, the director of the National Cancer Institute, more than two dozen biostatisticians and oncology researchers from academic institutions recommended ending the studies pending further outside review.
“Recently, published and peer-reviewed re-analyses of the work done by Potti and Nevins revealed serious errors that questioned the validity of the prediction models upon which these ongoing clinical trials are based,” the researchers wrote in a letter sent Monday.
If the studies continued without independent verification of the research, they wrote, patients might be assigned to improper drug treatments, potentially exposing them to health risks.
Duke had confidence in the outside analysis performed last year on the prediction model research, Mr. Stokke said. But, in light of the questions raised about Dr. Potti’s credentials, the clinical trial leaders decided on Sunday to stop enrolling new patients in the three cancer studies, pending a review of the data and science, he said.
The American Cancer Society also requested that Duke outline steps the medical center was taking to assure the accuracy and scientific validity of the research it sponsored, as well as inquiring about Dr. Potti’s credentials.
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本帖最后由 于 2010-07-22 02:17:00 编辑
| 以下是引用cqzhao在2010-7-22 2:24:00的发言：
google to notice that Rhodes Scholarship is a award for postgraduates. Compared these two events 唐骏的“学历门”and Anil Potti. You can know the totally different attitude and consequences to these kinds of things between China and the US. |
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本帖最后由 于 2010-07-22 02:16:00 编辑
- literary and scholastic attainments;
- energy to use one's talents to the full, as exemplified by fondness for and success in sports;
- truth, courage, devotion to duty, sympathy for and protection of the weak, kindliness, unselfishness and fellowship;
- moral force of character and instincts to lead, and to take an interest in one's fellow beings.
Rhodes Scholarship
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Rhodes Scholarship, named after Cecil Rhodes, is an international postgraduate award for study at the University of Oxford in Oxford, England,[1] and was the first large-scale programme of international scholarships.[2] Rhodes Scholars may study any full-time postgraduate course offered by the University,[3] whether a taught Master’s programme, a research degree, or a second undergraduate degree (senior status).
In the first instance, the scholarship is awarded for two years. However, it may also be held for one year or three years. Applications for a third year are considered during the course of the second year.
University and College fees are paid by the Rhodes Trust. In addition, Scholars receive a monthly maintenance stipend to cover accommodation and living expenses.[4][5] Although all scholars become affiliated with a residential college while at Oxford, they also enjoy access to Rhodes House, an early 20th century mansion with numerous public rooms, gardens, a library, study areas, and other facilities.
"For more than a century, Rhodes scholars have left Oxford with virtually any job available to them. For much of this time, they have overwhelmingly chosen paths in scholarship, teaching, writing, medicine, scientific research, law, the military and public service. They have reached the highest levels in virtually all fields."[6]
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[edit] History
Known as the "world's oldest and most prestigious international graduate scholarship",[7] the Rhodes Scholarships are administered and awarded by the Rhodes Trust, which was established in 1902 under the terms and conditions of the will of Cecil John Rhodes, and funded by his estate.[8] Scholarships have been awarded to applicants annually since 1902 on the basis of academic achievement and strength of character. There have been more than 7,000 Rhodes Scholars since the inception of the Trust. More than 4,000 are still living.[9]
In 1925, the Commonwealth Fund Fellowships (later renamed the Harkness Fellowships) were established to reciprocate the Rhodes Scholarships by enabling British graduates to study in the United States.[10] The Kennedy Scholarship program, created in 1966 as a living memorial to John F. Kennedy, adopts a comparable selection process to the Rhodes Scholarships to allow 10 British post-graduate students per year to study at either Harvard or MIT.[11][12]
[edit] Standards
Rhodes' legacy specified four standards by which applicants were to be judged:
This legacy originally provided for scholarships for the British colonies, the United States, and Germany. These three were chosen so that " ... a good understanding between England, Germany and the United States of America will secure the peace of the world ... "[8]
Rhodes, who attended Oxford University (as a member of Oriel College), chose his alma mater as the site of his great experiment because he believed its residential colleges provided the ideal environment for intellectual contemplation and personal development.
