Undisclosed financial conflicts of interest with pharmaceutical companies among the authors of the Esophageal Cancer Practice Guidelines 2017 by the Japan Esophageal Society.

Abstract

The clinical practice guidelines for esophageal cancer issued by the Japan Esophageal Society (JES) are widely referenced for the diagnosis and treatment of esophageal cancer.1 However, little is known about the financial conflicts of interest (FCOI) in the guidelines. We performed descriptive analyses on the personal payments (lecturing, consulting, and writing) made to the authors of the English and Japanese versions of the Esophageal Cancer Practice Guidelines 2017 by the JES1,2 from pharmaceutical companies using the publicly disclosed payment data from the pharmaceutical companies between 2016 and 2019.3 Among 20 English and 60 Japanese guideline authors, 20 (100%) and 54 (90.0%) received a total of $937,368 and $1,258,355 in personal payments from the pharmaceutical companies, respectively (Table 1). The chairperson received the highest total payment of $133,882. Six (30.0%) English authors received $138,505 payments, exceeding declaration requirements. Nevertheless, the guidelines stated that ‘all authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.’1 Furthermore, the correction published on 27 June 2022 stated that FCOI information was disclosed in the JES webpage, but we could not find this disclosure on the webpage as of 28 June 2022.4