The Darsee Case
Duquesne University
Undergraduate Research Program
Ethics Forum
June 25, 2012
Sarah Richards, Ryan Parker, Kelly Pham,
Katie Ratay, TJ Rohrabaugh
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Introduction
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John Darsee was a rising star in cardiology with a
seemingly bright future ahead of him
•
Harvard University
•
Colleagues caught him forging data
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Undergraduate degree from Notre Dame
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Medical degree from Indiana University in 1974
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Clinical work and research at Emory until 1979
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Introduction
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Research at Brigham and Women’s Hospital
•
Dr. Eugene Braunwald
→ Noted physician at head of medicine at Brigham and
Women’s Hospital and Beth Israel Hospital
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Worked over 90 hours a week, 100 publications over
14 years
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Introduction
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1981, colleagues told Braunwald that Darsee had been
mislabeling experiments
•
Put labels on experiments reading 24 seconds, 72 hours,
one week, two weeks
→ Only minutes had passed
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Braunwald rescinded the offer of Assistant Professor
from Darsee
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Terminated his research appointments with Brigham
and Women’s Hospital
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Introduction
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Braunwald launched an investigation
•
-
Darsee had been working in a multi-institutional
project funded by the NIH
•
-
Found nothing
Darsee’s work was substantially different from other
research Duke and Johns Hopkins
Harvard, NIH, Emory each convened separate
committees
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Ethical Issues
and Values
Ryan Parker
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Ethical Issue
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Fraud
•
Fabrication of data, findings, plagiarism, deliberate
distortion of actual data
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Evidence
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-
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Darsee’s amazing publication rate
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Over 100 abstracts & papers throughout short career
•
Raises suspecions
Robert A. Kloner & Edward Brown
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Coauthor & Lab Technician
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Mislabeling of hemodynamic experiments
Admission to fault
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How?
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Braunwald: “The reason we have complete confidence
is that the raw data were inspected at the most
fundamental level at the time they were gathered.
After 18 months or so it is not custom to hold onto a
fellow’s hand at every turn”
•
Lack of Supervision in lab
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Braunwald’s Time conflicts
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Allowed Darsee to continue
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Why?
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Institutional Pressures
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Personal Professional Gain
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Previously pulled it off
•
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Notre Dame
Outstanding record awed mentors
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Consequences and
Outcomes
TJ Rohrabaugh and Katie Ratay
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Darsee’s Outcomes
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He was not allowed to receive NIH funding for a 10 year
period
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The offer of a faculty position at Harvard was withdrawn
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He left the research field and became a critical care
specialist
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52 of his papers and abstracts from his work at Emory were
retracted
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30 of his papers and abstracts from his work at Harvard
were retracted
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Co-worker’s Outcome
Culliton, B. Science. “Coping with Fraud: The Darsee Case”. April 1, 1983. 220, 31.
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Co-worker’s Outcome
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The NIH required that Brigham & Women’s Hospital
refund $122,371
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Dr. Braunwald was placed under high scrutiny for
how he ran his lab
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The credibility of coauthors were brought under
suspicion
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Was this fair?
-
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For Darsee
•
Yes
•
Lost of funding and his removal from the research field
is just.
For his coauthors and fellow researchers
•
Not really
•
Just because someone they worked with was faking data
does not mean they are at fault as well.
•
However, Dr. Braunwald not informing the NIH of
Darsee’s fraud was a poor choice
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Consequences and
Outcomes
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Circumstances that may mitigate the culpability of
violation:
•
Darsee was overworked
•
Too high of expectations/ too much competition
•
The other research fellows were jealous and exaggerated
•
Dr. Braunwald was overstretched and did not pay
enough attention
•
Darsee may not have been properly instructed on ethics
Consequences and
Outcomes
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People who suffered because of the ethical breach:
•
Members of the labs where Darsee worked
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Dr. Braunwald
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People who co-authored with Darsee
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Other investigators on the NHLBI grant
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People who cited Darsee or used his findings as a basis
for their own research
•
People who recommended Darsee for career
advancements
•
People who suffer from heart disease
Consequences and
Outcomes
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Costs to Society:
•
Heart disease is one of the number one killers in
America and worldwide
•
Darsee’s actions may cause the general public to
question science in general
•
Other people may have decided not to pursue careers in
science because of Darsee
•
Much of Darsee’s funding was through the federal
government and therefore came from taxpayers
Recommendations
Kelly Pham
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Recommendations
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What actions should have been taken and by whom to
prevent this ethical violation?
•
Always question the situation.
→ The data being produced.
→ The exorbitant number of papers Darsee was producing
in such a short period of time.
•
Communication
→ Direct contact might have prevented Darsee from
fabrication.
→ Or the fabrication might have been caught earlier.
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Recommendations
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Ways to prevent this sort of ethical violation from
occurring again.
•
Hold mandatory ethical conferences and workshops.
•
Be firm and consistent; don’t play favorites.
•
Two phenomena are associated with fraud:
→ Pressure
→ Unusually large amount of publications from a particular
laboratory
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Recommendations
-
-
Is this case still relevant?
•
Most research provides the basis of medications and
treatments.
•
If the results are fabricated, people may be receiving
treatment that won’t help them at all, maybe even hurt
them.
Who benefits from knowing about this case?
•
Anyone who conducts research or reads research papers.
→ We must hold ourselves to an ethical standard.
→ We can’t assume that the data is correct.
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References
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Altman, L.; Melcher, L. British Medical Journal. “Fraud in
Science”. Jun 25, 1983. 286, 2003-2006.
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American Association for the Advancement of Science. Science.
“Harvard Delays in Reporting Fraud”. Jan 29, 1982. 215, 478482.
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Broad, William J. New York Times. “Notorious Darsee Case
Shakes Assumptions About Science”. June 14, 1983.
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Culliton, B. Science. “Coping with Fraud: The Darsee Case”.
April 1, 1983. 220, 31-35.
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Kochan, C.; Budd, J. Journal of the American Society for Information
Science. “The Persistence of Fraud in the Literature: The Darsee
Case”. 1992. 43(7), 488-493.
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