I love a good open debate about evidence. And we got one this week – thanks to an open access journal and the platform that great science writers now have by blogging and tweeting. The journal BMJ Open, self-described as “An open access, online-only general medical journal dedicated to publishing research from all disciplines and [...]
One day after we published a terrific guest column on how a BMJ news release sensationalized an observational study, with the headline “It’s official: chocolate linked to heart health,” NBC News kept dripping the chocolate hype. The BMJ news release spawned countless news stories. Just look at what a Google search turns up. On Twitter [...]
The following is a guest post by Kevin Lomangino, one of our story reviewers on HealthNewsReview.org. He is an independent medical journalist and editor who is currently Editor-in-Chief of Clinical Nutrition Insight, a monthly evidence-based newsletter which reviews the scientific literature on nutrition for physicians and dietitians. He tweets as @Klomangino. ——————————————————————————- Misreporting of Observational [...]
The Spine Journal has published a special June issue focusing on Medtronic’s INFUSE product, or rhBMP-2, a bone growth product commonly used in spine fusion surgeries. A journal news release states: A critical review of 13 industry-sponsored studies on a spine surgery product found that the actual risk of adverse events was 10 to 50 [...]
Larry Husten of Cardiobrief just tipped me off about this. He writes: Here’s something I’ve never seen: 12 minutes before the scheduled publication of a paper the journal publishing the paper announced that it had “made the decision not to publish” the paper. Here’s what happened: Last Thursday the JAMA/Archives media team issued a press [...]
This is a guest column by Ivan Oransky, MD, who is executive editor of Reuters Health and blogs at Embargo Watch and Retraction Watch. ——————————————————————————————————– One of the criticisms of health news coverage is that it is often too boosterish, breathlessly reporting new findings without any context, particularly when it comes to side effects. It’s [...]
Reuters Health published an important story, “Financial transparency skin-deep at medical journals.” Excerpts: “Nobody is making sure that authors declare their conflicts of interest. That has a very real potential to influence public health and corporate bottom lines, experts say, because researchers with industry ties are more likely to promote drugs and downplay side effects.…“At [...]
In an analysis published in the journal PLoS Medicine, Adriane Fugh-Berman and colleagues reflect on the facts that: “Even after the Women’s Health Initiative (WHI) found that the risks of menopausal hormone therapy (hormone therapy) outweighed benefit for asymptomatic women, about half of gynecologists in the United States continued to believe that hormones benefited women’s [...]
A new post on the Embargo Watch blog, “The power of the press release: A tale of two fish oil-chemotherapy studies,” addresses an issue that had me running around in circles for hours last week. Some news organizations were reporting on a paper in the journal Cancer, reporting that it had been published in that [...]
This is a guest column by Ivan Oransky, MD, who is executive editor of Reuters Health and blogs at Embargo Watch and Retraction Watch. One of the things that makes evaluating medical evidence difficult is knowing whether what’s being published actually reflects reality. Are the studies we read a good representation of scientific truth, or [...]
This story focuses on a family that may have a rare genetic mutation that increases their risk of heart disease. Unfortunately, the “rare” part wasn’t mentioned until 1,600 words into this 2,100 word story.
While this story adequately addressed 7 of our 10 criteria, the 3 on which it missed were significant omissions, yet could have been easily addressed.
Solid medical conference reporting, with many expert interviews and good context provided. Goes far beyond the conference presentation itself.
We will not display your name or e-mail address on the site, nor will we share youre-mail address with any third parties.
For site updates and news from Gary, find us on Twitter:
HealthNewsReview: @HealthNewsRevu
Gary Schwitzer: @garyschwitzer
Copyright © 2013 Health News Review
