Leading executives at academic medical centers often sit on the boards of pharmaceutical companies, creating potential conflicts of interest regarding both institutional oversight and research initiatives, according to a new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Nineteen of 47 pharmaceutical firms had a leader at an academic medical center sitting on their board, and received mean financial compensation of more than $312,000 a year, according to the study. "The data show there's not a single aspect of medical education, medical research or the practice of medicine in which financial relationships with the pharmaceutical industry are not ubiquitous," Eric G. Campbell, Ph.D., a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and research director for Mongan Institute for Health Policy in Boston, who's also done research on the subject, told Medscape Medical News. Read the full report at FierceHealthcare