It is the policy of AASLD to ensure balance, independence, objectivity, and scientific rigor in all its individually or jointly sponsored educational programs. All faculty participating in any AASLD sponsored programs are expected to disclose to the program audience any real or apparent conflict(s) of interest that may have a direct bearing on the subject matter of the continuing medical education (CME) program. This policy pertains to relationships with pharmaceutical companies, biomedical device manufacturers, or other corporations whose products or services are related to the subject matter of the presentation topic.
Individuals need to disclose relationships with a commercial interest if both (a) the relationship is financial and occurred within the past 12 months and (b) the individual has the opportunity to affect the content of CME about the products or services of that commercial interest.
Financial relationships are those relationships in which the individual benefits by receiving a salary, royalty, intellectual property rights, consulting fee, honoraria, ownership interest (e.g., stocks, stock options or other ownership interest, excluding diversified mutual funds), or other financial benefit. Financial benefits are usually associated with roles such as employment, management position, independent contractor (including contracted research), consulting, speaking and teaching, membership on advisory committees or review panels, board membership, and other activities for which remuneration is received or expected. ACCME considers relationships of the person involved in the CME activity to include financial relationships of a spouse or partner.
AASLD, as a CME provider, expects all speaker presentations be compliant with the ACCME content validation statements:
a. All the recommendations involving clinical medicine in a CME activity must be based on evidence that is accepted within the profession of medicine as adequate justification for their indications and contraindications in the care of patients.
b. All scientific research referred to, reported or used in CME in support or justification of a patient care recommendation must conform to the generally accepted standards of experimental design, data collection and analysis.
Providers are not eligible for accreditation if they present activities that promote recommendations, treatment or manners of practicing medicine that are not within the definition of CME, or known to have risks or dangers that outweigh the benefits, or known to be ineffective in the treatment of patients.
Presentations must give a balanced view of therapeutic options. Faculty is asked to use generic names to contribute to this impartiality. If trade names are used, those of several companies should be used rather than only that of a single company. In designing educational presentations, the speaker shall assure that the presentation is free of commercial bias for or against any product and, if the presentation is concerned with commercial products, the speaker must present objective information about those products, based on scientific methods generally accepted in the medical community. When an unlabeled use of a commercial product, or an investigational use not yet approved for any purpose is discussed during an educational activity, the speaker shall disclose to the audience that the product is not labeled for the use under discussion or that the product is still investigational.