VIoxx Warning Signs
Pharmacist Jennifer Hrachovec challenged Jeffrey Drazen, editor of the New England Journal of Medicine, about the Vigor study in a call to a Seattle radio show Aug. 14, 2001.
Hrachovec: "With this study in particular, it bothers me that there is more data from the trial than has ever been published and the New England Journal still hasn't published an editorial or any kind of update to let readers and clinicians using this drug and giving it to patients who they think will benefit from a better side-effect profile. My concern is that doctors are still using this and exposing their patients to higher risks of heart problems and they just don't even know that that's the case."
Drazen: "… We can't be in the business of policing every bit of data that we put out. We think that that's the role of people who know the field. And when they think that the field has advanced to the point where something which was true at the time it came out may no longer be true … having brought that evidence to our attention in the form of a manuscript or a letter, we can judge whether there's enough new information and put it out if we believe that the re-analysis is correct."
* * *
[Listen to NPR]
Listen to the full exchange on the Web site of KUOW, Puget Sound Public Radio. (Hrachovec's call begins at about minute 44:30.)
[permanent link]
Hrachovec: "With this study in particular, it bothers me that there is more data from the trial than has ever been published and the New England Journal still hasn't published an editorial or any kind of update to let readers and clinicians using this drug and giving it to patients who they think will benefit from a better side-effect profile. My concern is that doctors are still using this and exposing their patients to higher risks of heart problems and they just don't even know that that's the case."
Drazen: "… We can't be in the business of policing every bit of data that we put out. We think that that's the role of people who know the field. And when they think that the field has advanced to the point where something which was true at the time it came out may no longer be true … having brought that evidence to our attention in the form of a manuscript or a letter, we can judge whether there's enough new information and put it out if we believe that the re-analysis is correct."
* * *
[Listen to NPR]
Listen to the full exchange on the Web site of KUOW, Puget Sound Public Radio. (Hrachovec's call begins at about minute 44:30.)
[permanent link]
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