Abuses Endangered
Veterans in Cancer Drug Experiments
By DEBORAH
SONTAG
New York Times
02/06/2005
ALBANY - Carl M. Steubing,
a decorated Battle of the Bulge veteran whose experience of war made
him a pacifist but also instilled in him a zest for living life at full
tilt, took his diagnosis of gastroesophageal cancer in 2001 as a challenge.
With a thatch of
white hair and a rich baritone voice, Mr. Steubing, at 78, was not ready
to succumb to illness. A retired music educator and wedding photographer,
he remained active as a church choir director, expert cook, painter,
golfer and fisherman. He was married to a woman 24 years his junior,
and they had seven children and three grandchildren between them.
Mr. Steubing jumped
at the chance to participate in an experimental drug study at the Stratton
Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Albany, believing it offered him
the hope of surviving longer. The research coordinator, Paul H. Kornak,
told Mr. Steubing that he was "just a perfect specimen," with
the body of a man half his age, according to Jayne Steubing, Mr. Steubing's
widow.
He was not, though.
Because of a previous cancer and poor kidney function, Mr. Steubing
was not even eligible to participate in the experiment, according to
government documents. Mr. Kornak, however, brushed that obstacle aside.
He altered Mr. Steubing's medical records, according to prosecutors,
and enrolled him in the study. He also posed as a doctor.
In 2001, Mr. Steubing
endured about six periodic treatments with an aggressive three-drug
chemotherapy combination. Each infusion made him violently ill and forced
his hospitalization. He died in March 2002.
Last month, at the
federal courthouse in Albany, Mrs. Steubing glared at Mr. Kornak, 53,
as he pleaded guilty to fraud, making false statements and criminally
negligent homicide in the death of an Air Force veteran, James DiGeorgio.
When Mr. Kornak admitted to falsifying the medical data of "subject
initials CMS" - Carl M. Steubing - Mrs. Steubing's face crumpled.
Mr. Kornak, who
is scheduled to be sentenced in May, also agreed to cooperate in a widening
investigation of the hospital's cancer research program. From 1999 to
2003, when he worked there, scores of veterans were, at the least, put
at risk. But allegations of carelessness, fraud and patient abuse in
the hospital's cancer research program predated Mr. Kornak, and employees
say that administrators not only dismissed their concerns, but harassed
them for standing up for the veterans.
"Research violations
were a way of life at Stratton for 10 years," said Jeffrey Fudin,
a pharmacist at the hospital. "Stratton officials turned a blind
eye to unethical cancer research practices and punished those who spoke
out against them. The whole Kornak episode could have been prevented."
According to Mr.
Kornak's lawyer, E. Stewart Jones, there was a "clear systems failure,"
permitting a research culture where "rules weren't followed, protocols
weren't applied and supervision was nonexistent."
It was also a culture
whose descent into criminality forced the Department of Veterans Affairs
nationwide to reckon with what an internal memorandum in 2003 described
as "systemic weaknesses in the human research protections program,
especially in studies funded by industry."
Excluding simple
chart reviews, about 80 percent of the department's human research is
financed by industry. The private sector pumps considerable cash into
the system. In Albany, it accounted for $500,000 of the $1.15 million
in research funding in 2004.
Mr. Kornak, who
declined to be interviewed, does not appear to have derived financial
gain from his fraud. The Albany hospital's research program, however,
stood to benefit from the enrollment of patients, pulling in $5,000
from the drug company Aventis for Mr. Steubing's participation.
Although veterans
knew him as "Dr. Kornak," Mr. Kornak was not licensed to practice
medicine. Mrs. Steubing first learned this a year after her husband's
death when she read an article in The Times Union of Albany.
