PLoS medicine
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Trisha Greenhalgh and Jill Russell discuss the relative merits of “scientific” and “social practice” approaches to evaluation and argue that eHealth evaluation is in need of a paradigm shift.
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As part of the PLoS Epigenetics Collection, Caroline Relton and George Davey Smith discuss the potential of epigenetics for the treatment and prevention of common complex diseases, including cancer.
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transparency in reporting of conflict of interest is an increasingly important aspect of publication in medical journals. Publication of large industry-supported trials may generate many citations and journal income through reprint sales and thereby be a source of conflicts of interest for journals. We investigated industry-supported trials' influence on journal impact factors and revenue. ⋯ publication of industry-supported trials was associated with an increase in journal impact factors. Sales of reprints may provide a substantial income. We suggest that journals disclose financial information in the same way that they require them from their authors, so that readers can assess the potential effect of different types of papers on journals' revenue and impact.
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The PLoS Medicine editors discuss further the paper by Peter Gøtzsche and colleagues on journals' competing interests. The editorial reinforces the call by Harvey Marcovitch for journals to be transparent and thus discloses PLoS Medicine's sources of income for 2009.
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Pharmaceutical companies spent $57.5 billion on pharmaceutical promotion in the United States in 2004. The industry claims that promotion provides scientific and educational information to physicians. While some evidence indicates that promotion may adversely influence prescribing, physicians hold a wide range of views about pharmaceutical promotion. The objective of this review is to examine the relationship between exposure to information from pharmaceutical companies and the quality, quantity, and cost of physicians' prescribing. ⋯ With rare exceptions, studies of exposure to information provided directly by pharmaceutical companies have found associations with higher prescribing frequency, higher costs, or lower prescribing quality or have not found significant associations. We did not find evidence of net improvements in prescribing, but the available literature does not exclude the possibility that prescribing may sometimes be improved. Still, we recommend that practitioners follow the precautionary principle and thus avoid exposure to information from pharmaceutical companies. Please see later in the article for the Editors' Summary.