For readers of Empire of Pain and Dopesick, an arresting deep dive into how Alzheimer’s disease treatment has been set back by corrupt researchers, negligent regulators, and the profit motives of Big Pharma.
Nearly seven million Americans live with Alzheimer’s disease, a tragedy that is already projected to grow into a $1 trillion crisis by 2050. While families suffer and promises of pharmaceutical breakthroughs keep coming up short, investigative journalist Charles Piller’s Doctored shows that we’ve quite likely been walking the wrong path to finding a cure all along—led astray by a cabal of self-interested researchers, government accomplices, and corporate greed.
Piller begins with a whistleblower—Vanderbilt professor Matthew Schrag—whose work exposed a massive scandal. Schrag found that a University of Minnesota lab led by a precocious young scientist and a Nobel Prize–rumored director delivered apparently falsified data at the heart of the leading hypothesis about the disease. Piller’s revelations of Schrag’s findings stunned the field and the public.
From there, based on years of investigative reporting, Doctored exposes a vast network of deceit and its players, all the way up to the FDA. Piller uncovers evidence that hundreds of important Alzheimer’s research papers are based on false data. In the process, he reveals how even against a flood of money and influence, a determined cadre of scientific renegades have fought back to challenge the field’s institutional powers in service to science and the tens of thousands of patients who have been drawn into trials to test dubious drugs. It is a shocking tale with huge ramifications not only for Alzheimer’s disease, but for scientific research, funding, and oversight at large.
Praise for Doctored
“People touched by this disease in any way will want to read Doctored, both to get a sense of how Big Pharma is impacting treatment options and to learn about efforts like Schrag’s to correct course.” –Book Page
“At times, Piller’s narrative reads like a noirish detective story, complete with tense conversations who seem to be working an angle rather than facing facts….[it’s] a troubling look at the corruption of Big Science.” –Publishers Weekly
“Doctored meticulously reveals a world of scientific fraud, its unsuspecting victims, and the sleuths and heroes fighting to fix it. This should be required reading for aspiring scientists, policymakers, and anyone who will one day be touched by a devastating disease – which is all of us.” –Ivan Oransky, MD, Distinguished Journalist in Residence, New York University and co-founder of Retraction Watch
“A riveting must-read master class in science journalism. For those of us who want to ‘trust the science,’ Doctored is the necessary reminder that trust has to be earned.” –Gary Taubes, bestselling author of Rethinking Diabetes, The Case Against Sugar, and Good Calories, Bad Calories
”Doctored takes the reader on a fast-paced ride through a web of scientific misconduct in Alzheimer’s research that has wasted billions of dollars and misled the public. Charles Piller follows neuroscientist Matthew Schrag and a group of other sleuths as they uncover shameful actions in influential studies, while journals, federal agencies, and universities drag their feet in correcting the record. The book is a call to action to reform a system that prioritizes reputation, revenue, and liability above the public interest.” –Holden Thorp, Editor-in-Chief of Science
“A beautifully told, shocking story of the destructive effects that individual ambition and dishonesty have had on the entire field of Alzheimer’s research. Through diligent and intelligent journalism, Piller has done an enormous service in detailing both the extent of fraudulent Alzheimer’s research and the troubling inability of the research community to deal with Science fabricators and their contamination of widely-held beliefs.” –Rob Howard, Professor of Old Age Psychiatry, University College London
“Doctored is a riveting, deeply researched journalistic investigation. Piller leaves you glued to the page as you discover how hubris, greed and negligence collide in the quest of a cure for Alzheimers. It’s the story of a courageous whisteblower, Matthew Schrag, who risks everything by exposing the truth, and the institutions – universities, regulators, academic journals – who fail to uphold academic integrity. A shocking tale about medicine, and the amyloid hypothesis in particular, this investigation is a must-read for researchers, students, policymakers, and everybody who wants to truly understand how science is made and unmade.” –Marina Gerner, award-winning journalist and author of The Vagina Business
”Piller’s clear-eyed forensic journalism combines with a story of subterfuge and deceit that reads like the best of crime fiction. Doctored is disturbing and timely.” –Jacqueline Yallop
