Federal Register: April 2, 2009 (Volume 74, Number 62)
DOCID: fr02ap09-58 FR Doc E9-7411
DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES
Health and Human Services Department
NOTICE: NOTICES
DOCID: fr02ap09-58
DOCUMENT ACTION: Notice.
SUBJECT CATEGORY:
Findings of Scientific Misconduct
DOCUMENT SUMMARY:
Notice is hereby given that the Office of Research Integrity
(ORI) and the Assistant Secretary for Health have taken final action in the following case:
Robert B. Fogel, M.D., Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's
Hospital: Based on information that the Respondent volunteered to his
former mentor on November 7, 2006, and detailed in a written admission
on September 19, 2007, and ORI's review of Joint Inquiry and
Investigation reports by Harvard Medical School (HMS) and the Brigham
and Women's Hospital (BWH), the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS) found
that Dr. Robert B. Fogel, former Assistant Professor of Medicine and
Associate Physician at HMS, and former CoDirector of the Fellowship in
Sleep Medicine at BWH, engaged in scientific misconduct in research
supported by National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI),
National Institutes of Health (NIH), awards P50 HL60292, R01 HL48531,
K23 HL04400, and F32 HL10246, and National Center for Research Resources (NCRR), NIH, award M01 RR02635.
PHS found that Respondent engaged in scientific misconduct by
falsifying and fabricating baseline data from a study of sleep apnea in
severely obese patients published in the following paper: Fogel, R.B.,
Malhotra, A., Dalagiorgou, G., Robinson, M.K., Jakab, M., Kikinis, R.,
Pittman, S.D., and White, D.P. ``Anatomic and physiologic predictors of
apnea severity in morbidly obese subjects.'' Sleep 2:150155, 2003
(hereafter referred to as the ``Sleep paper''); and in a preliminary abstract reporting on this work.
Specifically, PHS found that for the data reported in the Sleep paper, the Respondent:
Respondent also published some of the falsified and fabricated data in an abstract in Sleep 24, Abstract Supplement A7, 2001.
Dr. Fogel has entered into a Voluntary Settlement Agreement in
which he has voluntarily agreed, for a period of three (3) years, beginning on March 16, 2009:
(1) To exclude himself from serving in any advisory capacity to
PHS, including but not limited to service on any PHS advisory
committee, board, and/or peer review committee, or as a consultant;
(2) That any institution that submits an application for PHS
support for a research project on which the Respondent's participation
is proposed or that uses the Respondent in any capacity on PHS
supported research, or that submits a report of PHSfunded research in
which the Respondent is involved, must concurrently submit a plan for
supervision of the Respondent's duties to the funding agency for
approval; the supervisory plan must be designed to ensure the
scientific integrity of the Respondent's research contribution; a copy of the supervisory plan must also be submitted to ORI by
[[Page 14991]]
the institution; the Respondent agrees that he will not participate in
any PHSsupported research until such a supervisory plan is submitted to ORI; and
(3) To ensure that any institution employing him submits, in
conjunction with each application for PHS funds or report, manuscript,
or abstract of PHSfunded research in which the Respondent is involved,
a certification that the data provided by the Respondent are based on
actual experiments or are otherwise legitimately derived and that the
data, procedures, and methodology are accurately reported in the
application or report. The Respondent must ensure that the institution
sends the certification to ORI.
SUMMARY:
Findings of Scientific Misconduct,
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT
Director, Division of Investigative
Oversight, Office of Research Integrity, 1101 Wootton Parkway, Suite 750, Rockville, MD 20852, (240) 4538800.
John Dahlberg,
Director, Division of Investigative Oversight, Office of Research Integrity.
[FR Doc. E97411 Filed 4109; 8:45 am]
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