A friend sent me a notice found on the Bulldog Reporter website, which is designed to help public relations people pitch their stories to journalists. The item was entitled, “AP Radio Welcomes News and Information Related to Healthcare, Eldercare.” It appears to be a clear invitation to PR people to send audio clips along with [...]
The Boston Globe offers a good look at how peer review of medical research by medical journals is not perfect. In the Globe: “Now, after a study that sent reverberations through the medical profession by finding that almost one-third of top research articles have been either contradicted or seriously questioned, some specialists are calling for [...]
Unbelievable. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports that a KDKA-TV medical “reporter,” who is a physician, was “peddling Joint Formula 88 joint pain relief cream ($21.90) on QVC.” Worse, if it can get worse, is that the cream is his product. Did anyone talk to this guy about journalism ethics before hiring him? I just spoke to [...]
Often I criticize health news coverage in this blog. Today, I praise a reporter for nailing a story. Andre Picard of the Toronto Globe and Mail hit a home run with his story, “Be Skeptical About the Herceptin Hype.” Herceptin is a drug intended for certain types of breast cancer. Picard writes: “The most eye-popping [...]
Suddenly lung cancer is a hot topic in newsrooms. Peter Jenning dies one day. The next day Christopher Reeve’s widow announces she has lung cancer. So it is understandable that some well-intentioned “disease awareness” efforts would come forward. But journalists should employ facts and full disclosure when giving attention to such disease awareness campaigns. (The [...]
I just finished reading an important new book, “Selling Sickness: How The World’s Biggest Pharmaceutical Companies Are Turning Us All Into Patients,” by Ray Moynihan and Alan Cassels. It documents disease-mongering, how drug companies foster the creation of medical conditions to create markets for their pills, the marketing of fear, the “medicalization” of normal states [...]
This is becoming a recurring theme: journalists working in news rooms while also doing paid public relations work. A Minneapolis-St. Paul TV anchor did it. A Nashville TV reporter did it. (Although she called me yesterday to explain that she’s not doing it anymore.) And now Detroit Medical Center announced that it has named a [...]
ABC World News Tonight broadcast a story last night, a portion of which is captured on their website, about patients’ own stem cells used to build new blood vessels. It is interesting clinical research, but the story offered only breathlessly optimistic projections — no caveats, warnings, unknowns or uncertainties. An excerpt: “Results in more than [...]
We look for more critical analysis of FDA expedited approval of a new drug like this.
Five-star story on small study that tries to counter large body of evidence on soy supplements for hot flashes.
Our reviewers, including a leading women’s health clinician-researcher, felt this piece would have been benefited from more data and context.
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