This release reports the results of a randomized, multicenter, sham-controlled clinical trial testing the safety and efficacy of a new approach to controlling essential tremors in the elderly — magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)-guided focused ultrasound — to alter the thalamus in the brain and thus control tremors. The approach would be an alternative to the current procedure — deep-brain stimulation — which is more invasive.
The study showed substantial improvement in a reduction of tremors for many patients at three-, six- and 12-months. But it also showed that about a third of the patients in the study experienced not insignificant adverse effects from the procedure. The release presents a glowing picture of the promise of this new approach while disregarding the caveats offered both in the journal paper and an accompanying editorial about the study.
To see how a news outlet covered this new research, see our review of a STAT article. Like the news release, the STAT story didn’t provide us enough quantification of the benefits or mention a potentional conflict of interest between researchers and device manufacturers. But the STAT article picked up on some things the release missed, including more discussion of the harms observed in the study.
Estimates are that essential tremors affect as many as 10 million Americans, many of whom are not helped by medications and who may not be candidates for the current surgical remedy — deep-brain stimulation. If proven safe and effective after long-term studies, this less invasive alternative would give patients and health care professionals more options for dealing with a condition that negatively affects the quality of life for many.
The release mentions cost, saying, “Because the approach is so new, insurance plans will not yet cover the procedure, though that may change in the coming months. The cost at UVA has not yet been determined.” But the procedure is still neurosurgery which is inherently expensive. Readers might benefit from knowing the cost of the current alternative surgical approach to treating this condition, deep-brain stimulation. The fact that other language in the release does come close to marketing this procedure for the medical center is also troubling.
We’ll give this release credit for including numerical data on patient improvement during the study: “they found that mean tremor scores improved by 47 percent at three months and 40 percent at 12 months. Participants reported major improvements in their quality of life. People who couldn’t feed themselves soup or cereal could again do so.” Unfortunately, it omits a host of other numerical data contained in the NEJM paper that places the patient improvement in a less-glowing perspective, issues like the reduction in improvement over time experienced by some patients and the extent of adverse effects (see below). It’s quantification data was based on relative rather than absolute improvements and it was not clear what those improvements meant functionally. The release could have described the range of the scale and given the actual tremor scores. This would have been more informative than describing a 47% reduction which could represent a very large or relatively small changedepending on what the baseline scores were.
Had the release included some of the caveats pointed to in an editorial about the same study carried in the journal, readers would have a clearer picture of just how important this new procedure was.
The release mentions harms in this statement: “The most commonly reported side effects were gait disturbances and numbness in the hand or face; in most instances, these side effects were temporary but some were permanent.” But that is by no means enough. More than a third of the patients in the study developed gait problems or numbness, or both, that in some cases persisted for 12 months. Others developed ataxia, unsteadiness and weakness that was persistent. The release seems to go overboard in downplaying these adverse effects and amplifying the positive outcomes. Releases should never cherry-pick the data from a study.
The release mentions that this clinical trial was a randomized, multi-center, sham-controlled study with a small but reasonable number of patients, given the procedure involved. It provides specifics on the patient population and the scope of their disease, as well as an explanation of how improvements were determined. The release would have been improved with a description of how improvement (or lack thereof) was measured.
The release does not appear to disease-monger.
This release identifies the funders of the study but fails to point out that the principal investigator has a financial relationship with the manufacturer of the device used in the study.
In addition, the published study notes that “Representatives of the manufacturer of the focused ultrasound system used in the study (InSightec) provided study oversight and technical support and obtained national regulatory permissions.” Allowing the device manufacturers to have “study oversight” suggests a potential for bias when most studies are obligated to keep a firewall between investigators and financial sponsors.
The release never mentions the current alternative approaches used to treat essential tremors, either the pharmacological approach with drugs such as propranolol or primidone, or the neurosurgical approach of deep-brain stimulation.
The release is clear in that the medical center is preparing to make the procedure available to qualified patients but it certainly is not available to the public at this time. It also mentions the uncertainty of insurance coverage.
The release points out that the trial is “the most in-depth assessment yet of the safety and effectiveness” of this new approach to dealing with essential tremors. And since the procedure is less invasive than the standard surgical intervention now in use, it is certainly novel enough to warrant a news release.
The release steps over the line several times in its use of hyperbole, beginning with the headline, “Scalpel-free surgery proves safe, effective for treating essential tremor,” that ignores the high proportion of adverse effects reported in the study and the limited time — 12 months — that the study covered. Saying a procedure is safe without long-term studies is an exaggeration. Further on, subheads refers to it as a “pioneering tremor trial” and “groundbreaking research.”
Systematic, Criteria-Driven
The @nytimeswell effort is shown to be unwell once again.
There's pervasive media bias toward hyping treatment benefits while neglecting negative results & harms.
Big part of this is reliance on experts with financial &/or intellectual conflicts of interest.
Att'n journalists: Use this list 100 independent experts to correct imbalance https://twitter.com/garyschwitzer/status/1177189641218330625
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