Professional activities
DECLARATION OF INTEREST - MY ETHOS
Individuals who offer clinical advice, or who are involved in drafting local or national guidelines and policies are rightly expected to conduct themselves in an ethical and transparent manner, without bias, and without the perception of bias. Equally, support from the Pharmaceutical Industry and Charities has yielded patient benefits which would not otherwise have accrued through exclusive reliance on the NHS or other funding agencies. Examples of this in my case are pharmaceutical support for investigator-led clinical studies, participation in educational programmes, conference attendance and sponsorship of the HIV and hepatitis drug interactions websites. In all cases these activities are strictly governed by principles established by the UK ABPI.
My personal ethos is as follows:
• I do not engage in activity which is intended to be promotional in nature, favouring one company or product above another.
• I accept speakers fees for lectures only where these are for the sole purpose of medical education or stimulating clinical debate, using slides I have personally assembled or vetted. I do not use trade names when identifying drugs, and avoid displaying corporate logos. I declare my interests at the start or end of all my talks.
• Any ‘expert’ opinions I advance are backed up by data where available, and with no influence from whoever is sponsoring the meeting.
• I accept research funding support for clinical studies only if they address an important and relevant clinical problem. These studies are led, conceived, executed and analysed by my research team.
• I also participate in international, multi-centre clinical trials of new drugs funded by industry, as long as they are clinically relevant, ethically approved and medically justified.
• While the HIV and hepatitis drugs interactions websites receive industry sponsorship, editorial content remains independent, and overseen by an International Editorial Board (see www.hiv-druginteractions.org and www.hepatitis-druginteractions.org for details). We are occasionally challenged by our users over certain drug interaction calls we have made, and while this may prompt a review, any subsequent change is only made by the editorial team using robust evaluation criteria we have established around strength of recommendation and quality of evidence (based on GRADE).
• I submit annual declarations of Interest to the Royal Liverpool University Hospital NHS Trust
Declaration of Interests (2023-2025):
Research Support
• ViiV Healthcare (DolPHIN and DoRIS studies in Kampala and Cape Town)
• Merck (DORADO trial in South Africa)
• GSK / Vir (AGILE CST-5 trial)
• Ridgeback (AGILE CST-2 trial)
Other Sponsorship
• HIV Drug Interactions tools (Gilead, ViiV, Merck, Janssen)
• Hepatitis Drug Interactions tools (Gilead, AbbVie, Janssen)
• COVID Drug Interactions tools (Pfizer, Shinogi, Abbvie, Gilead, MSD, Sobi)
Speakers Honoraria
• ViiV, Pfizer, Gilead
Advisory Boards
• ViiV
Patents, royalties, financial interest in pharmaceutical industry
• nil (and no family interests)
Private practice
• nil
Organisations I have been associated with
- www,hep-druginteractions.org
- Sahir House ( Mersey HIV Community Group)
- www.hiv-druginteractions.org