Quantifying the Variability of Financial Disclosure Information Reported by Authors Presenting Research at Multiple Sports Medicine Conferences

In the study reported here, we com­pared self-reported industry rela­tionships of authors who attended 3 major orthopedic sports medicine conferences during a single calen­dar year. Our goal was to calculate the variability between disclosure information over time.

A significant percentage of authors who attended these meet­ings were inconsistent in submitting their disclosure information. In addi­tion, most authors with irregularities had more than 1 discrepancy. We believe that the vast majority of the observed discrepancies did not result from intentional deception on the part of the authors but instead from ongoing confusion regarding which industry relationships should be acknowledged for particular meetings (some specialty societ­ies require that all relationships be divulged, whereas others require only those affiliations directly appli­cable to research being presented).

In the absence of a uniform dis­closure policy that is widely adopted by many specialty societies, these findings suggest that the disclosure process will continue to be plagued by inconsistent reporting of finan­cial conflicts of interest.