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Healthy Skepticism Updates

Update 2006-11-23

UPDATES USUALLY ONCE A MONTH
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HEALTHY SKEPTICISM INTERNATIONAL NEWS
October 2006 Vol 24 No 10
Don't judge a paper by its abstract
By: Peter Parry

Peter Parry is a consultant child & adolescent psychiatrist who became interested, perplexed and then troubled after closely comparing the abstract of a highly important paper to his clinical practice with the paper's own results in the body of its text. The paper in question "Fluoxetine, Cognitive-Behavioural Therapy and Their Combination for Adolescents with Depression - Treatment for Adolescents with Depression Study (TADS) Randomised Control Trial" highlights problems in current research and medical publication. Abstracts may reflect bias of the researchers or study sponsors and distort findings of the research.

Go to: www.healthyskepticism.org/global/news/int/hsin06-10

HEATHTY SKEPTICISM MANAGEMENT GROUP 2006-07

Executive:

Chair: Jon Jureidini, (Child Psychiatrist) Adelaide, Australia

Deputy Chair: Agnés Vitry (Pharmacy) Adelaide, Australia

Treasurer: Heather Carter (GP) Adelaide, Australia

Secretary and Director: Peter Mansfield (GP) Willunga, Australia

Other Management Group Members:

Dee Mangin (GP) Christchurch, New Zealand

Joana Ramos (Social Work) Seattle, USA

Joel Lexchin (Emergency Medicine and Health Policy) Toronto, Canada

Jörg Schaaber (Sociology and Journalism) Bielefeld, Germany

Melissa Raven (Public Health) Adelaide, Australia

We cover a wide range of disciplines, 4 continents (Joanna has many contacts in South America) and 5 languages: English, French, German, Portuguese, Spanish.

 

Updates homepage

 

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Next Update: Update 2007-02-03

Previous Update: Update 2006-11-09

Updates homepage






Cases of wilful misrepresentation are a rarity in medical advertising. For every advertisement in which nonexistent doctors are called on to testify or deliberately irrelevant references are bunched up in [fine print], you will find a hundred or more whose greatest offenses are unquestioning enthusiasm and the skill to communicate it.

The best defence the physician can muster against this kind of advertising is a healthy skepticism and a willingness, not always apparent in the past, to do his homework. He must cultivate a flair for spotting the logical loophole, the invalid clinical trial, the unreliable or meaningless testimonial, the unneeded improvement and the unlikely claim. Above all, he must develop greater resistance to the lure of the fashionable and the new.
- Pierre R. Garai (advertising executive) 1963