AHCJ opposes taking taxpayer-funded research out of public’s reach
Filed under: Government, Health journalism, Public records, Studies
Congress should not roll back public access to taxpayer-funded research reports, AHCJ wrote in a letter to members of Congress (PDF).
AHCJ is opposing the Research Works Act (H.R. 3699), which would remove the public’s access to medical journal articles about publicly funded research. They are currently available for free to the public no more than 12 months after their publication in a medical journal.
“Our board of directors believes strongly that more transparency, not less, is vital for the public to assess how funds are spent and to benefit from and learn about the research underwritten by the government,” board president Charles Ornstein wrote in a letter to the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. “The recently introduced Research Works Act is a step in the wrong direction.”
In the letter, AHCJ rebutted medical publishers’ assertions that the current system doesn’t work.
“We understand the objections of such publishers, who contribute editorial support and fear loss of income,” Ornstein wrote. “But it’s worth noting that much of that support comes from unpaid peer reviewers. And publishers still maintain a year of exclusivity, enabling them to reap profits during the time when interest in research is highest.”
In 2010, AHCJ voiced concerns about a similar bill, which did not become law.
AHCJ weighs in on FCC broadcast transparency proposal
Filed under: Conflicts of interest, Health journalism
AHCJ is supporting a new effort to require broadcasters to report their funding sources online, because that would make it easier for people to recognize infomercials that masquerade as news.
The practice of broadcasting reports that, unbeknownst to viewers or listeners, are paid for by hospitals or other health-care organizations has long been a concern. For example, in 2010 a health reporter for a CBS affiliate in Los Angeles appeared in a segment interviewing a hospital’s chief medical officer – paid for by that hospital. The segment looked like news but the hospital considered it advertising. Viewers were left to guess.
Now, the Federal Communications Commission is proposing rules requiring that sponsorships be posted online in a searchable database. Currently, such information is available only to people who go to the station and ask to review paper files.
In comments filed Thursday with the FCC, AHCJ President Charles Ornstein wrote that AHCJ’s principles oppose giving favored treatment to advertisers and special interests, and having a personal or financial interest in a company being covered.
“Such practices are especially pernicious when applied to matters of health and health care – as they often are – because people make decisions affecting their well-being based on such reports,” Ornstein wrote. “The result is harm to individuals who make the wrong choice based on biased information and increased costs in the health care system that we all pay for.
“Such deceptiveness also threatens the credibility of all journalism. A bright line must be drawn between those who say what they’re paid to say and those who make an independent effort to find out what’s true.”
In 2008, AHCJ joined with the Society of Professional Journalists to provide guidelines opposing what has been called “pay for play.”
For more information about the FCC rules and the issues that prompted them, see this Washington Post story and this column in Columbia Journalism Review. The rules can be found here, and if you’d like to file your own comment, go here. (Use proceeding number 00-168.)
Ohio’s hospital transparency law under fire
Filed under: Aging, Conflicts of interest, Europe, Government, Health care reform, Health data, Health journalism, Health policy, Hospitals, Hot Health Headline, Member news, Public records, Studies, Tools
Thanks are due to blogger and one-time hospital executive Paul Levy for drawing our attention to the Ohio hospital industry’s recent push to overturn much of the state’s recently passed transparency legislation.
The law required hospitals to post performance data, such as infection rates and patient satisfaction, on the Ohio Hospital Compare site.
According to Brandon Glenn’s report in the MedCity News, the hospital industry opposes the site, online since Jan. 1, 2010, because it serves the same purpose as the federal Hospital Compare site.
The OHA supports the new legislation… because it wants to remove “duplicative” reporting requirements on the state’s hospitals. Ohio hospitals already report the same data to a federal Hospital Compare website maintained for the public by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, said OHA spokeswoman Tiffany Himmelreich.
The new legislation “doesn’t reduce reporting. It just eliminates reporting the same information to two different places,” she said. “We don’t want the public to feel that this is taking a step backwards in terms of data availability.”
For their part, consumer advocates say website maintenance is not an onerous burden, and that the hospital association’s push is part of a larger, statewide antitransparency trend.
As an interesting side note, Glenn found the Ohio Hospital Compare site to be rendered inoperable by apparent bugs on an initial visit but discovered that, after his inquiries to the state health department, the site was put into working order.
Officials were a no-show for panel on government transparency, science news
Six journalists and an empty chair gathered at the National Press Club yesterday for a discussion about whether the Obama administration has lived up to early promises of openness and transparency in science news.
Photo by epSos.de via Flickr
Despite multiple invitations from Curtis Brainard, science editor for the Columbia Journalism Review, the chair designated for a representative from the Obama administration remained empty. It was symbolic of the relationship reporters say they have with many public information officers in the government.
We are hoping for an archived version of the webcast but, in the meantime, this Storified collection of tweets hits the high points, with suggestions for journalists and those working in government to improve the relationship.
The panel, which included AHCJ board member Felice Freyer, was cosponsored by the National Press Club, Columbia Journalism Review, Society of Environmental Journalists and Reporters Without Borders.
Earlier: Panel of science, health journalists will discuss government transparency in webcast panel
Former Practitioner Data Banks official says HRSA ‘erroneously interpreting the law’
Filed under: Government, Health data, Health journalism, Public records
A former federal official criticized a decision by the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration for removing the Public Use File of the National Practitioner Data Bank from the agency’s website – a major development as journalism groups fight to restore access to the important tool.
Timeline: National Practitioner Data Bank Public Use File
Letter and statement from Robert Oshel (PDF)
Letter to Sebelius (PDF)
See how reporters have used NPDB’s public use file to expose gaps in oversight of doctors
Letter to members of Congress (PDF)
HRSA letter to Bavley (PDF)
Articles, editorials about public access to the NPDB public use file (PDF)
Sept. 15, 2011: AHCJ, other journalism organizations protest removal of data from public website
Get the NPDB public use file
Investigative Reporters and Editors, working with the Association of Health Care Journalists and the Society of Professional Journalists, has posted the data for download, free to the public.
Robert Oshel, who created the Public Use File in the mid-1990s and managed it until his retirement in 2008, said in a statement released to the Association of Health Care Journalists on Sunday that HRSA is “erroneously interpreting the law” governing the data bank.
The National Practitioner Data Bank is a confidential system that compiles malpractice payouts, hospital discipline and regulatory sanctions against doctors and other health professionals. For years, HRSA has made a public version of it available without identifying information about the health providers.
HRSA officials removed the public file from the data bank website last month because a spokesman said they believe it was used to identify physicians inappropriately.
But in his letter to AHCJ, Oshel said HRSA officials have confused the requirements of the law.
“HRSA’s current management seems to confuse the law’s requirement that a public data file not permit use of its records to identify individual practitioners with a very different requirement, and one not in the law: that the file not allow the records of previously identified practitioners to be identified in the file,” Oshel wrote.
Oshel further wrote that HRSA’s view will “seriously hinder use of the file for important public policy research.”
“For example, it will be impossible to identify state licensing boards which are not taking action to protect the public from physicians with records of repeated malpractice payments and serious sanctions against their hospital clinical privileges based on the quality of their care or their behavior,” he wrote.
As he notes in his letter, Oshel served as associate director for research and disputes for HRSA’s Division of Practitioner Data Banks, which operates the National Practitioner Data Bank, from 1997 *(updated) until his retirement in 2008. Among other duties, he personally designed the Data Bank’s Public Use File in about 1995 and oversaw its development and quarterly updating.
AHCJ President Charles Ornstein said Oshel’s letter reaffirmed what AHCJ and five other journalism groups are fighting for. He said the Public Use File has been a vital tool for journalists writing about insufficient oversight of physicians in their states. Without such articles, some unsafe doctors would very likely continue to be practicing with clean licenses and patient protection legislation in several states likely would not have been enacted.
“It is abundantly clear that HRSA made a mistake in taking the Public Use File offline, putting physicians’ interests ahead of patient safety,” Ornstein said. “With Robert Oshel’s detailed statement, we call on HRSA and HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to make the right decision and restore access to the public version immediately.”
In his letter, Oshel also criticized the process that HRSA introduced as an interim way for reporters and researchers to request data from the data bank. To get information, individuals must disclose the focus of their work and HRSA officials must approve – or reject the request. If the request is granted, HRSA officials will be the arbiters of what data fields an individual needs to complete the research.
“I believe HRSA’s current policy is contrary to the law,” he wrote.
* There was a typo in the date in an earlier version of this post.
Earlier coverage
- AHCJ, other journalism organizations protest removal of data from public website
- Journalism organizations offer data government blocked from public
- More journalism groups join effort to restore access to National Practitioner Data Bank
- Agency declines to restore public data
- Journalists turn to Sebelius for access to National Practitioner Data Bank file
Panel of science, health journalists will discuss government transparency in webcast panel
Filed under: Government, Health journalism, Health policy, Public health, Studies
A panel at the National Press Club this afternoon, which will be webcast, will look at government transparency when it comes to science news.
Six journalists, including AHCJ board member Felice Freyer, will take part. Representatives of the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Health and Human Services and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy have been invited.
The moderator is Seth Borenstein, science reporter for The Associated Press. The other speakers include Curtis Brainard, CJR’s science editor; Joseph Davis, Society of Environmental Journalists; Darren Samuelsohn, Politico’s senior energy and environment reporter and Clothilde Le Coz, Reporters Without Borders.
The panel will be webcast at 3 p.m. ET.
From the event description:
Access Denied: Science News and Government Transparency
Has the Obama administration lived up to its promise to make science more transparent and accessible to the public? An investigation in the current issue of Columbia Journalism Review finds that despite President Obama’s early promise to create an open government, the nation’s science reporters feel there has been little to no progress since the Bush administration.
The panel discussion is free and open to the public. It is cosponsored by the National Press Club, CJR, SEJ, and Reporters Without Borders. A cash-bar reception will follow.
Public becoming more active in pursuit of goverment information, media less active
The public’s interest in government transparency is growing and citizens are “becoming more active in asserting their right to government information,” according to a new survey from the Media Law Resource Center and the National Freedom of Information Coalition.
The survey also found, perhaps less surprisingly, that news organizations are less likely to sue for access to public information because of a lack of resources.
The new findings include both good news and bad, said Kenneth F. Bunting, executive director of the National Freedom of Information Coalition.
“If ordinary citizens are becoming more aware of their access rights, and more assertive regarding them, it is indeed a reason to be gratified,” he said. “However, if news organizations are trending toward being less gung-ho in an area once regarded as a matter of responsibility and stewardship, there is the frightening potential that journalism could suffer, as could the health of our democracy.”
Among the findings:
- Media lawyers and representatives of the NFOIC member coalitions said they had seen an increased number of open government violations in recent years.
- The number of open records requests made by private citizens and other non-media organizations has increased.
- 60 percent of media lawyers surveyed noted a decrease in open government lawsuits by media organizations over the past five years.
The survey also looked at the prevalence and effectiveness of FOI hotlines, finding that they “got generally high marks from all respondents.”
Read more:
- Press release
- Results of both surveys (PDF)
- Results of survey to media lawyers (PDF)
- Results of survey to NFOIC members (PDF)
(Hat tip to Joey Senat, Ph.D.)
POGO fears disclosure rule is in jeopardy
Filed under: Conflicts of interest, Public records
A database that would document the financial ties between researchers who are funded by the The National Institutes of Health and medical companies is in jeopardy, according to the Project on Government Oversight (POGO).
Under the proposed requirement, NIH-funded researchers at medical schools and universities would have to publicly disclose their financial ties to medical companies. In March, POGO sent a letter to Dr. Francis Collins, the Director of the NIH, urging him to implement this idea, which he had shown support for.
But POGO is concerned that the White House’s Office of Management
and Budget may weaken or block the rule. The organization has sent a letter to the OMB director in support of the rule.
Previously: NIH Proposes Rule to Shine Light on Potential Conflicts of Interest
Ontario considers exempting some hospital records from FOI law
Filed under: Health journalism, Hot Health Headline, Public records
Legal Feeds blogger Glenn Kauth, of the Canadian Law Times, reports that Ontario’s legislature is currently considering a law containing a little-known provision that would exempt from FOI law “information provided to, or records prepared by, a hospital committee for the purpose of assessing or evaluating the quality of health care and directly related programs and services provided by the hospital” starting Jan. 1, 2012 (scroll down to Schedule 15).
The leader of a provincial nurses’ organization took issue with the provision, telling the London Free Press that “The public has a right to know what’s happening in its local hospitals,” but Ontario health officials say hospitals need the exemption.
Health Minister Deb Matthews has defended the move to exempt information related to quality of care from public release. According to the Free Press, Matthews believes subjecting hospitals and doctors to greater scrutiny would prevent open dialogue about problems and how to fix them. “They must have a very open and frank discussion,” she said.
(Hat tip to Paul Levy, whose post on the matter also has some great first-hand material from Denmark)
AHCJ joins objections to proposed cuts to federal transparency websites
Filed under: Government, Health policy, Public records
All eyes are on the federal budget negotiations today, with most attention focused on whether or not an impasse will lead to a government shutdown. But thousands of people have expressed concern over proposed budget reductions to a number of data transparency and government accountability programs.
The Sunlight Foundation says, “The budget for Data.gov,USASpending.gov, the IT Dashboard, and other data transparency and government accountability programs funded through the Electronic Government Fund would be slashed from $34 million to $2 million if the Full-Year Continuing Appropriations Act passed by the House or considered by the Senate became law.”
The Association of Health Care Journalists has added its name to a letter organized by the Sunlight Foundation objecting to the proposed cuts and asking that Congress sustain funding for the programs.
Those interested in signing the letter or otherwise contacting congressional representatives to weigh in on the topic can visit the Sunlight Foundation’s page.
Public Letter: Save Online Transparency Programs (updated 4/2/2011)
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New at HealthJournalism.org
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- Tips for print, online journalists to embrace broadcast opportunities
- Numbers reveal how often, or how rarely, states check doctors’ disciplinary records
- How I did it: Falsified charts in nursing homes linked to patient care
- Access Denied: Looking at a lack of health care availability
- Transparency & medical errors: Public reporting of patient harm is a potent force
