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SHORT REPORTS: Tongeji Tungaraza and Rob Poole Influence of drug company authorship and sponsorship on drug trial outcomes The British Journal of Psychiatry 2007; 191: 82-83 [Abstract] [Full text] [PDF]

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A Basic Statistics Perspective on Tungaraza and Poole, 2007

Allan Abbass   (1 August 2007)

A Basic Statistics Perspective on Tungaraza and Poole, 2007 1 August 2007
Allan Abbass, Director of Education Department of Psychiatry, Dalhousie University Send letter to journal: Re: A Basic Statistics Perspective on Tungaraza and Poole, 2007 allan.abbass{at}dal.ca Allan Abbass	Dear Sir: I appreciate the BJP for publishing this study examining the influence of industry involvement on outcomes and publication. I wish to add a simple way to describe the outcomes. The industry- authored papers were 34 times (74/2) more likely to report results in favour of the drug while independant authored papers were only 1.75 (28/16) times more likely to. Thus, industry-authored papers were a staggering 21 times or 2100% more likely to report results in favour of the drug! Using the same rudimentary approach, industry sponsored studies were a mere 43% (2.5/1.75) more likely to report positive findings, a difference that would reach significance with a larger sample. This obviates the need for us all the scrutinize studies and take note of conflicts of interest in our clinical decision-making. Sincerely Yours, Allan Abbass