# Health body questions use of drug company funding

- Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2015/05/07/health-body-questions-use-of-drug-company-funding/
- Published: 2015-05-07T16:14:07+01:00
- Author: Howard Lake

**The Health Services Executive (HSE) in Ireland is reviewing how funds raised from
pharmaceutical companies are used following the revelation in [Independent.ie](http://www.www.independent.ie)
that two hospital posts have been funded from that source.**

Connolly Hospital in Dublin used the drugs company money – paid through a charitable
company – to fund a registrar in rheumatology and a locum consultant to work full
time in the public hospital. The drugs companies in question include Abbvie, MSD,
Pfizer and Roche, some of which provide drugs to treat rheumatology.

The hospital used the drugs company funds to pay for the registrar’s post for more
than seven years while it started using drugs company funds to finance a full-time
locum consultant physician last year. The information came from a Freedom of Information(
FOI) request by the Sunday Independent.

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The FOI showed that the HSE was unaware of what it called the “unusual” funding 
arrangement until the newspaper submitted questions about it in January. In an email
to the acute hospitals division, HSE Director General Tony O’Brien asked whether
there was a “conflict of interest” in the drug company funding of medical posts,
whether the arrangement was “transparent” and whether it breached pay rules, according
the Sunday Independent.

In its reply to the HSE, Connolly Hospital said there was no conflict of interest,
that it was transparent and that it did not breach pay rules. It said “multiple 
companies” were involved in funding the post of locum consultant, and it pointed
out that the funds were provided through a charitable company.

The Health Service Executive (HSE) is now reviewing how drug company money and other
external funds are being used in the public health service

Meanwhile, Connolly Hospital in Blanchardstown has since stopped using drug company
funds to pay for the rheumatology registrar and is also “regularising” the consultant
post, according to documents released under the Freedom of Information Act.

The hospital drew on the drugs company funds to pay for the registrar’s post for
more than seven years, the documents reveal, while it started using drugs company
funds to finance a full-time locum consultant physician last year.

The HSE said the “registrar post has been regularised and is no longer funded externally.”
Meanwhile, “regularising the consultant post” in line with HSE rules had been agreed
with the hospital.

“Separately there is a requirement to re-state the rule set in relation to the use
of charitable funds and philanthropy for public health services. We also need to
review the rules in relation to clinical trials and ensure that there is clarity
about the use of such external funds for posts,” the HSE said.

Drug company support for hospitals is regulated in the UK by the Association of 
the British Pharmaceutical Industry Code of Practice for the Pharmaceutical Industry.

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