Yale medical school professor Kimberly Yonkers accused of ghostwriting
Yale Daily News
December 3, 2010
A School of Medicine faculty member has been accused of signing her name to a ghostwritten study, a practice that many believe amounts to plagiarism and undermines scientific integrity.
The nonprofit watchdog Project on Government Oversight (POGO) claims that School of Medicine associate professor Kimberly Yonkers signed her name to work that was not her own in a 2003 report on the antidepressant Paxil. POGO executive director Danielle Brian and investigator Paul Thacker sent a letter Nov. 29 to the director of the National Institutes of Health, the organization which POGO said funds some of Yonkers’ research, identifying about four separate cases of alleged ghostwriting. One of these was Yonkers’ study, which POGO claims was part of a promotion scheme by pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline to increase Paxil sales. But Yonkers says she was extensively involved in writing and editing the report.
When asked about POGO’s accusation against Yonkers by the News Thursday morning, School of Medicine Dean Robert Alpern said this was the first he had heard of it. He said the administration will need to look at the allegations further before deciding whether or not to investigate.
“We will examine the situation thoroughly before we make a decision to investigate,” Alpern said.