They include a top institute official, prominent researchers and psychiatrists serving on a special watchdog panel charged with safeguarding patients in experiments. Psychiatric Institute Deputy Director Jack Gorman's outside income is so extensive that he had to attach extra pages to the standard financial disclosure form. Records show he took home lecture and advisory-board fees from Pfizer, Janssen Pharmaceutical, Eli Lilly, SmithKline Beecham and other drug manufacturers. Gorman is the lead researcher on an experiment sponsored by Pfizer, according to the Psychiatric Institute's Web site posting of 200 current experiments and studies. Gorman did not return The Post's calls.
Researchers are then beholden to the drug companies.
The 31-member IRB, which meets monthly, has the power to decide which proposed experiments on mentally ill adults and kids may go forward and whether they meet all federal and state rules to protect patients. The psychiatrists in question on the panel are Laurence Greenhill of the Psychiatric Institute and Zafar Sharif of Creedmoor Psychiatric Center. Greenhill picked up extra spending money as a consultant to Alza Corp., Bristol-Myers Squibb, Richwood and Glaxo, while Sharif received speaking fees from Eli Lilly and Janssen. Psychiatrists on the IRB are barred from voting on experiments in which they would be the lead researcher. Critics charge that the patient-protection panel is a rubber stamp for drug giants and their handmaiden researchers.