David’s blog
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Club 329: Part 1Editorial Note: This post is by Leonie Fennel. It’s one of two involving Leonie. Last week, Dr Ben Goldacre gave a public lecture in the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin (organised by the 3U Partnership and the very lovely Dr Ruth Davis). Dr Goldacre is a doctor, academic, campaigner and writer; he is also […]
The Pill That Steals LivesKatinka Blackford Newman talks about her new book Its now nearly three years ago since I woke up and found myself in a mental hospital in North West London. I looked down and saw wealds on my arms where I had torn my skin apart. There was a mirror in the tiny room where I’d […]
Restoring Study 329: Letter to BMJ Jan 2016Editorial Note: This was our final letter in the correspondence that began here and ran through here. There has been no response from Dr Godlee. 28 January 2016 Dr Fiona Godlee Editor, BMJ Re: BMJ handling of conflict of interest Dear Dr Godlee Thank you for your email response of January 11 2016 to our […]
Restoring Study 329: Letter to BMJEditorial Note: The posts have gotten slightly out of sequence. This post should have preceded the responses from BMJ. It is the letter to which they were responding. This and other letters are on Study329.org. 8 July 2015 Dr Fiona Godlee Editor BMJ Dear Dr Godlee Re: “Restoring Study 329: A randomised, controlled trial of […]
Restoring Study 329: Correspondence with BMJ Jul 15 to Jan 16Editorial Note: The letter from the Study 329 team to BMJ re Dr Loder featured in 50 Shades of Gray and in Conflicts of Interest. The actual letter and related correspondence is all on Study329.org. The emails below and in the next post tell you what happened next. From: Jureidini, Jon (Health) Sent: Wednesday, 8 July 2015 […]
The Archers: Rob and HelenEditorial Note: There is no-one I know who admits to listening to The Archers. But everyone in Britain knows of it – the longest running British radio soap. It begins with a horrible theme tune that has me hitting off instantly. But all changed in the last week or two. The Archers is now featuring […]
Study 329: Response to Keller & ColleaguesEditorial Note: This post offers our response to the Keller letter. It was published in BMJ in early February. Again all material is available on Study329.org. The response does not make much of the fact that not all of the Als in Keller et al have lined up to sign their letter. One of the […]
Study 329: Nobody Pinned Anything on UsEditorial Note: Following the publication of Study 329 Restored, Martin Keller and his co-authors gave an initial response in which they said Nobody Pinned Anything on Us and also that they would respond in more detail later. It took four months for this response to appear. Our Response will follow in the next post and […]
Study 329: Republic to EmpireEditorial Note: This post is from Sally MacGregor. In depositions and lectures I commonly state that I have had more support and information from colleagues working for industry than from clinical colleagues. I loved the analysis of the derailment of medicine and research through the comparison between a Republican and Empire structure, and the take-over […]
Pharmaceutical Rape: Ending our ToleranceEditorial Note: This is the final part of Laurie Oakley’s series on Pharmaceutical Rape. All six parts with better imagery (no-one is enthusiastic about the Martin Shkreli images) and extra text are available here as a PDF Download. Pharmaceutical violence Pharmaceutical violence is a social issue as well as medical problem that demands a social response and […]
Pharmaceutical Rape: DiscriminationEd Note: This is the fifth and penultimate post in Laurie Oakley’s Pharmaceutical Rape series. Pharmaceutical violence is a social injustice that can intersect with every other type of oppression and form of discrimination. Dehumanizing in its own right, pharmaceutical rape (and the cultural/medical denial of it) compounds the distress already experienced by persons in socially […]
Pharmaceutical Rape: Doctors still know bestEditorial Note: This is part 4 of Laurie Oakley’s series on Pharmaceutical Rape. Many who experience life-altering, adverse outcomes after taking their medicines as prescribed do not receive acknowledgment of what they have experienced, let alone the medical care they need. Medical systems do not recognize many treatment related outcomes and patients are therefore denied […]
Pharmaceutical Rape: The Good PatientThis is part 3 of Laurie Oakley’s series on Pharmaceutical Rape. In our society We learn a social script in which a “good patient” obeys the orders of doctors as authority figures. The ideal patient is a passive patient, subordinate to the physician. We are expected to relate to doctors as experts whose judgment we […]
Pharmaceutical Rape: Cast of CharactersEd Note: This is part two in Laurie Oakley’s Pharmaceutical Rape series. WHEN IT COMES to pharmaceutical rape, it is no simple task to determine just who the “rapists” are (or to determine the safety or lack of safety of the treatments that they promote), but we are certain that the behavior exists, and that […]
Pharmaceutical Rape is not a MetaphorEd Note: This is the first of a 5 part series on Pharmaceutical Rape by Laurie Oakley. We are looking for images to illustrate the series and would welcome any cartoons or other images that are germane to themes below. The first image here is Martin Shkreli, the man who raised the price of Daraprim […]
Little Red StethoscopeTo be read in conjunction with Little Red Riding Hood. Once a newly qualified doctor, wearing her red stethoscope, set out to treat an older woman, bringing medicines and the milk of human kindness. As the doctor was walking through the hospital, the medical director came up to her and asked where she was going. […]
Little Red Riding HoodThis is the first of a two part piece. Little Red Stethoscope follows. More on the current post can be found in Images of Trauma. A grimm tale The development of psychoanalysis depended heavily on Freud’s approach to the interpretation of dreams and myths. Key to these interpretations were his claims about the symbolic nature […]
Antidepressants & The UndeadSeveral of us involved in RxISK.org monitor other groups setting up to offer information on medicines. Some of these, like eHealthMe, offer useful information sometimes with innovations we wish we had thought of first. The general sales pitch is under the umbrella of Personalized Medicine. As ever, pharmaceutical companies are in there early. The Brintellix […]
Motivation Is Worth More Than Expertise?Editorial: I was asked to MHRA (Britain’s FDA) to give a 20 minute presentation on Spontaneous Reporting Systems to a group looking at a birth defect related issue. This is close to what was said – minor items like the HRT trials got lost in delivery. The Slides numbered in the text are attached Here. […]
The Ghost of Research FutureEditorial Note: This post is by Johanna Ryan. As with all posts by Jo, it unearths angles on current stories that everyone else seems to have missed. A column here last month followed the legacy of Study 329 into the present. By taking apart one 2015 study of Vraylar, a new antipsychotic, I tried to […]
Study 329: Big RiskEditorial Note: This is the Fourth Crusoe Report. “Death waits for these things like a cement floor waits for a dropping light bulb” Big pharma Study 329 seems to fit the classic picture. It has Big Pharma ghostwriting articles, hiding data, corrupting the scientific process and leaving a trail of death, disability and grieving relatives […]
Study 329: BMJ TransparencyTwo weeks ago The BMJ ran an editorial by Richard Smith (former editor) and Fiona Godlee (current editor) on the retraction of a 1989 article by R K Chandra under the heading of A Major Failure of Scientific Governance. While making money from the publication of pharmaceutical company trials, and in the face of a […]
Study 329: 50 Shades of GrayEditorial Note: None of these posts about Study 329 should be taken as representative of a RIAT view, especially this one. See Study 329: Conflicting Interests for a prequel to this post and to make sense of the last comment. Fiona Godlee to RIAT July 6 2015 Re: Study 329 Dear Dr Jureidini, “Many thanks for […]
Study 329: Conflicts of InterestEmail from Fiona Godlee (Editor of The BMJ) to RIAT July 6th 2015 Re: Study 329 Dear Dr Jureidini, Many thanks for your letter. I quite understand you concerns. You are right to say that there are few or no precedents against which to compare this article. We ourselves are feeling our way, both with […]
Study 329 in JapanEditorial Note: By 2002 GlaxoSmithKline had done 3 studies in children who were depressed and described all three to FDA as negative. As an old post on Bob Fiddaman’s blog reproduced here outlines, several years later they undertook another study in children in Japan. Regular readers of this blog will know how I broke the […]
Study 329: By the Standards of the TimeEditorial Note: This post by Johanna Ryan looks at an element of the defense offered by Neal Ryan and others, namely that by the standards of the time the authors of 329 weren’t doing much wrong. Getting real about clinical research The controversy over “Study 329” on the effects of Paxil in teen depression has […]
Study 329: Minions No LongerA few weeks ago I was asked to review Good Pharma by Don Light and Antonio Maturo. The published review appears in TES – here. It makes a great foil to the Data Wars post earlier this week. The problem was deciding if the title for this post should read Minions no Longer or Underlings […]
Study 329: Data WarsSensing the end of the Roman Republic and unhappy at the approach of Empire, Cassius approached Brutus to save the Republic. “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, But in ourselves, that we are underlings.” The Republic was a Democracy, with a Government answerable to its Electors. Caesar’s conquests meant that the Roman […]
Study 329: MK, HK, SK, GSK & HistoryWhat happened to those suicidal in study 329? In May 2014, the RIAT team asked GSK what the children who became suicidal in the course of Study 329 have since been told. (Marty Keller’s “take” on this is at the bottom). The consent form says that anyone entering the study would be treated just the […]
Study 329: MK, HK, SK and GSKThe Letter below from Marty Keller and colleagues was sent to many media outlets, to retraction watch, and to professional organizations on Wednesday. Paul Basken from the Chronicle for Higher Education asked me for a response which I sent about an hour after receiving the letter. This response is from me rather than the 329 […]
Copyright © Data Based Medicine Americas Ltd.