It reiterates much of what I have said in previous posts. In
particular, if there is no underlying mechanism that is directly
related to real science (for example, "nutrition" must be reducible to
biochemistry, which then can't conflict with basic chemical laws -
unless you want to do the experiment and demonstrate that these
fundamental laws are incorrect), then put it aside if you can't explain
it in a rigorous way at this point. It might be helpful in the future,
but for now, you SHOULD NOT base important decisions on such
studies/reports.
Source: sciencedaily.com
5/31/2005
Researchers Largely At Fault For Health Risk Studies That Influence And
Confuse The Public
ATLANTA, May 23 -- The general public may not be reading the Archives
of General Psychiatry or the New England Journal of Medicine, but they
are basing important health care decisions and lifestyle changes on the
research findings that these and other journals publish, particularly
when such findings concern risk factors. Moreover, these scientific
reports frequently are interpreted by clinicians, policy makers and the
news media as calls to action, only later to be refuted or questioned
by conflicting studies that may even claim serious and harmful
consequences from those actions.
"What is a risk? What is a risk factor? Are all risk factors equal?
What is the threshold for true clinical significance? The general
public can't be expected to understand these questions, let alone know
the answers. Yet, ultimately, they are the ones who are most affected
by journal articles that include words like 'risk' that even some of us
working in research are not accurately defining," David J. Kupfer,
M.D., the Thomas P. Detre Professor and chairman of the department of
psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, told his
colleagues at the American Psychiatric Association Annual Meeting.
Researchers must be more rigorous in how they design and conduct
clinical studies as well as be more mindful of the language they use to
describe their findings in the scientific literature or in writing
reviews of other research, asserted Dr. Kupfer in a session devoted to
discussion about risk factors in medicine and psychiatry.
Dr. Kupfer is co-author of the recently published To Your Health: How
to Understand What Research Tells Us About Risk (Oxford University
Press, 2005).
According to Dr. Kupfer, a look at the past year's newspaper headlines
about antidepressants being linked to increased risk of suicide in
children and adolescents exemplifies how research influences society
and yet can paint a confusing picture.
"In truth, these studies, which received much attention from the press,
overestimated the risk and underestimated the benefit of prescribing
antidepressants to children and teens. But clinicians and parents alike
were at a loss to understand their meaning."
"How do we sort out these contradictions?" questioned Dr. Kupfer. "We
have a responsibility to the general public, who on a daily basis hear
about new findings or ways to reduce risks of disease that are
extrapolated from a study and then reported by the media. But too
often, these reports are confusing or include data taken out of context
and offer conflicting information about what puts us at risk for
diseases."
Dr. Kupfer believes that to advance medical science and promote public
health, research must be both flawless and accurately presented.
In order to generate more reliable and meaningful findings, Dr. Kupfer
urges researchers to be more precise in defining, understanding and
evaluating types of risk factors, including their statistical and
clinical significance, and be more discerning of others' published
results that may form the basis to their own research or can be cited
in their own publications.
"If we are rigorous in organizing, conducting, presenting and
evaluating scientific research -- specifically psychiatric research --
then we are taking important steps in fitting this research into the
larger framework of discovering the causes and ways to prevent diseases
and disorders. Researchers are on the front line of accomplishing these
changes. We are responsible for the quality of the studies that we
conduct and for the interpretation of our studies to the media, the
general public and our colleagues. These new standards are aimed at
raising the bar and will ultimately encourage well-designed and
correctly interpreted research that will help in our shared goal of
advancing science," said Dr. Kupfer.