Grassley Probes Ex-Army Surgeon's Medtronic Links

An influential Republican Senator is investigating a former Walter Reed Medical Center surgeon who the Army says forged signatures and falsified data in a study touting the benefits of an implant from Medtronic.

Sen. Charles Grassley has long been a critic of the drug industry's influence over physicians, but increasingly the Iowa senator has turned his scrutiny on ties between surgeons and companies like Medtronic, the largest medical device maker in the world.

In a letter to the Walter Reed Medical Center, Grassley asks the Army to hand over all materials from its investigation of Dr. Timothy Kuklo, who authored a paper on Medtronic's Infuse spinal implant that later had to be retracted after publication.

The Army's report, completed last October, found that Kuklo forged the signatures of four colleagues on the paper before submitting it to a British medical journal, where it was published last summer. The Army also said Kuklo's claim that he reviewed 138 veterans treated for leg wounds for the study did not match Walter Reed's own records.

Minneapolis-based Medtronic confirmed Tuesday that Kuklo is a consultant for the company but said the research discussed in the article was conducted before he started working for Medtronic.

Spokeswoman Mary Thorsgaard tried to distance Medtronic from the study, saying the company "did not participate in the collection or analysis of the data, the preparation of the manuscript for the journal article, or the submission."

In his May 15 letter to Walter Reed, Grassley presses Army officials on whether Kuklo properly disclosed any and all financial conflicts of interest.

Kuklo retired from the Army in 2007 and is now a professor of orthopedic surgery at Washington University in St. Louis. The Army is not pursuing disciplinary action against Kuklo, although it notified Medtronic and Washington University of its findings.

A spokeswoman for the university on Tuesday could not confirm whether the university is investigating Kuklo.