The Sidebar

On December 6 the University of Cincinnati News Record published an article about a handful of media inquiries I'd sent re: a research study conducted in Barbados, West Indies:

The study tested whether or not a modified version of the Heimlich Maneuver could stop an acute asthma attack....The 67 children who participated were between the ages of six and 16....

"Since at least 1996, based on dubious evidence, my father has claimed that the Heimlich Maneuver can stop asthma attacks, but asthma experts have expressed strong doubts," Peter Heimlich said...."A couple weeks ago, I sent inquiries to Queen Elizabeth Hospital and to Donville Inniss, the Barbados Minister of Health, asking for the name of the IRB and when the (Ministry of Health's) Ethics Committee approved the study," Peter Heimlich said. "I haven't received any answers."

Professor Anne St. John accepting Distinguished Community Service Award from Steve Blackett, Barbados Minister of Social Care, Constituency Empowerment and Community Development, June 2012 (source)

On December 16, the Barbados Sunday Sun published a related article by reporter Maria Bradshaw that included (emphasis added):

The Barbados study was conducted by a team of researchers led by respected paediatrician, Professor Anne St John.

In an email to this newspaper, she stated that the study did receive approval from the local Institutional Review Board; that no harm was done to any of the 67 children who participated; and that the Ministry of Health was carrying out an investigation into the matter....

The Sun article didn't include the name of the IRB or the name of the Ministry of Health official who's in charge of the investigation.

Also from the Sun:

(Peter Heimlich says that his father) contributed US$1000 to the Barbados study....

To be precise, in response to an inquiry I received from Ms. Bradshaw, I wrote her that, based on documents in UC's Henry J. Heimlich Archival Collection, the Heimlich Institute (not my father) had contributed $1,000.

Also note his mentioning additional funding from Rotary. (More about that in a future item.) 





Finally, also from the Sun:

(Peter Heimlich) said he had evidence that in 1999 his father attempted to conduct a similar asthma study at Cincinnati’s Deaconess Hospital, but had been turned down by the hospital’s Institutional Review Board (IRB).

Last month I was contacted by a chum who has followed my efforts to bring to public attention the Heimlich Institute's illicit (and apparently illegal) human experiments on AIDS patients in Africa.

My chum told me about an internet dust-up that had been going on at blogs and websites that follow nutrition science, a subject about which I have no expertise or interest. (Full disclosure: I consume food.)


According to said chum, a researcher at the University of Washington named Stephan Guyenet was planning a human study looking into what causes obesity, but it was apparently terminated for unknown reasons.

"Well," I responded. "If you want to learn more, since the school's a public institution, why not submit a public records request?"

The chum then presented the following reasoned response.

"I don't want to. Would you do it?"

Not a surprise. Chum has a history of trying to persuade me to do tasks. I usually don't bite, but this was a simple chore that might result in an easy blog item.

So I asked the U of W to provide "any and all related records including but not limited to the proposed study."

Here's what I received:



For ease of comprehension (there are a lot of duplicate e-mails), I copied and re-formatted them in chronological order. Some didn't have complete headers, but they were all dated so here's what I came up with. (I don't think I made any goofs, but if I did, send me an e-mail and I'll repair. Want copies with the full headers? Submit your own $%#@& records request. To download a pdf of both versions, click here.)



Long story short, on September 5, someone by the name of Francis Pomeroy e-mailed Wendy S. Brown RN, Assistant Director of U-Dub's Human Subjects Division.

Over the next few days, Ms. Brown engaged in a cordial e-mail exchange with Dr. Guyenet and Noella A. Rawlings who, according to this web page, is an attorney who represents the school in matters that include human subjects research.

On September 8, Dr. Guyenet informed Ms. Brown: 

I have decided to end my participation in this study and advise my collaborators not to undertake it. There is no way for me to obtain IRB approval without my mentor, who understandably is not interested in doing this study. In retrospect, there are a number of problems with this idea that I didn't understand at the time. As I said before, I am 100% committed to upholding my responsibilities to the UW and to the NIH. I appreciate you helping me with this.

Based on the e-mails, my understanding is that Dr. Guyenet's mentor is professor of medicine Michael W. Schwartz MD.

So who is Francis Pomeroy? A quick Google of his name and e-mail address didn't yield any clues, so it may be a pseudonym.

No, it's not me. Years ago I used a pseud to drop a dime to UCLA's Office of Human Subjects Protection about the Heimlich AIDS experiments in China which resulted in a bunch of news reports, but I had nothing to do with this.

Anyway, in search of an easy follow-up, I'm e-mailing this item to Francis Pomeroy. If anything interesting comes back, I'll post an update.

UPDATE, 11am EST: 15 minutes ago I sent an e-mail to francispomeroy@hotmail.com and this bounced back: