Misleading Clinical Trial Results- A Historical Review

Historical Review of the Use of Relative Risk Statistics in the Portrayal of the Purported Hazards of High LDL Cholesterol and the Benefits of Lipid-Lowering Therapy

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For example, if a heart attack occurs in 2% of those in the placebo group and in 1% of those in the drug-treated group, the benefit to the treated population is only one percentage point better than no treatment. This finding is unlikely to generate much enthusiasm from the study sponsors and in the reporting of the findings to the public. Instead, trial directors can amplify the magnitude of the appearance of the treatment benefit by using the relative risk (RR) value of a 50% reduction of the risk of a heart attack, since one is 50% of two.

I think it's all about the money/funding. Researchers want to get funding, so it benefits them to be more dramatic in their presentation ..

The medical/scientific establishment seems to be giving bad research a pass. Why?

The review focuses on the misrepresentation of the benefits of cholesterol reduction therapy, but also alerts us to research that cherry picks the findings, resulting in the misrepresentation of the implications of those findings.


Other quotes of note:

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Richard Horton, editor of the Lancet, expressed the opinion that “much of the scientific literature, perhaps half, may simply be untrue” [1]. A similar sentiment was expressed by John Ioannidis, professor of medicine, epidemiology, and population health at Stanford, who stated, “There is increasing concern that in modern research, false findings may be the majority or even the vast majority of published research” [2]. Marcia Angell, former editor of The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), disclosed, “It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines” [3].

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