Bethesda, MD - A US senate investigator is asking the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to provide details about renowned heart-failure specialist Dr Marvin Konstam, currently acting as a senior advisor to the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) director, Dr Betsy Nabel, under a one-year contract.

In a letter sent to NIH director Dr Elias A Zerhouni, Sen Charles E Grassley (R-IA) notes that while Konstam remains on staff as a professor of medicine at Tufts-New England Medical Center and is scheduled to take up a new post at Tufts when his contract with the NIH expires in December, he is also the medical director for Orqis, a company developing medical devices for the treatment of congestive heart failure. Of concern to Grassley is the fact that Konstam has retained his positions at Orqis and Tufts while working for the NIH; full-time NIH employees are barred from having financial relationships with industry.

"I'm concerned that the NIH may be avoiding intramural conflict-of-interest policies by hiring experts as contractors instead of as full-time employees," Grassley writes.

Grassley has asked Zerhouni to provide an explanation as to how such a situation could "come to pass," as well as supply copies of Konstam's financial-disclosure filings, details on the contract between him and the NIH, and specifics as to what the NHLBI paid Konstam for salary and moving expenses and where those funds are coming from. Grassley also asked Zerhouni whether Konstam "has received any compensation from other institutions and/or companies during the time he was employed by NHLBI."

Contacted by heartwire, Konstam insisted he could not comment in any way on the senate query. Nabel, also contacted by heartwire, would not specifically address the issue of whether the NIH was sidestepping the conflict-of-interest regulations. Responding to questions through a press officer, Nabel emphasized that Konstam has remained an employee of Tufts and is not authorized to approve or make any grant or contract awards or conduct research in the NHBLI intramural program. Nabel also stressed that Konstam "was forthright in disclosing all of his external activities" prior to taking up his temporary post with the NIH.

Echoing a statement also issued by Zerhouni, Nabel reiterated that her office will be "working closely with Sen Grassley and his staff to address the concerns and questions outlined in the letter."

Grassley's letter notes that, just last week, Orqis issued a press release on one of its products, quoting an enthusiastic Konstam and listing his affiliation as both medical director for the company and professor at Tufts, but earlier this year, during his NIH contract, Konstam published a paper studying an Orqis device, giving his Tufts contact information. Meanwhile, notes Grassley, the Health and Human Services website lists Konstam as a senior NHLBI advisor, with a phone number and email account; a Boston Globe news story from April 2008 describes him as a "senior advisor for NHLBI"; and a heartwire story, published in July 2008, gives his Tufts affiliation.

"Obviously, anyone would be confused about who is Dr Konstam's employer," Grassley writes. "Tufts? The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute? Orqis?"

Both a statement from Tufts University and from Nabel, in her response to heartwire, clarified that
Konstam had accepted the position as chief physician executive at the new Tufts Medical Center Cardiovascular Center at the beginning of 2009.