Faked Data on Effexor, Celebrex, Vioxx and 18 Other Drugs

jason_els

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In what must be one of the top breaches of medical ethics in recent history, a researcher who published positive results for certain drugs in anesthesiology journals, has admitted to publishing fabricated data.

These results were used by drug makers to vouchsafe their products to the FDA, pharmacologists, and other physicians.

This article in The Wall Street Journal details the situation and some of the drugs involved:

We&#8217;ve followed plenty of controversies around drug trials, from ghostwriting to keeping quiet about unflattering results. But the latest news is particularly eye-popping: A prominent Massachusetts anesthesiologist allegedly fabricated 21 medical studies involving major drugs. Yikes.

Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Mass., has asked several anesthesiology journals to retract the studies, which appeared between 1996 and 2008, the WSJ reports. The hospital says its former chief of acute pain, Scott S. Reuben, faked data used in the studies.
 
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snoozan

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FYI he faked the data for Effexor as a pain drug, not as an antidepressant. Vioxx has been pulled from the market. This is just one set of studies from one man in a specific clinical setting. It doesn't mean the drugs are ineffective.

It's sad, but faked data is not a new thing, which is why it's important that there be multiple studies done on the same subject.
 

Guy-jin

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FYI he faked the data for Effexor as a pain drug, not as an antidepressant. Vioxx has been pulled from the market. This is just one set of studies from one man in a specific clinical setting. It doesn't mean the drugs are ineffective.

It's sad, but faked data is not a new thing, which is why it's important that there be multiple studies done on the same subject.

And you really bring up the truly sad part about the whole thing: With more research into these drugs, it would be possible to determine who would actually benefit from them and who would be at risk taking them.

Vioxx, for example, can seriously help people who aren't susceptible to the negative side effects, which is a minority group. But because they rushed it out thanks to these kinds of falsifications, it's now blacklisted entirely.

Not completely related, but: One of the other terrible lying scientists of recent times is Andrew Wakefield, who falsified data that concluded vaccinations cause autism. It was his study that gave credence to the anti-vax movement, and although 7 of the authors on that original study have retracted it, although investigators have found direct evidence that Wakefield falsified the data, and although countless studies since have never been able to conclude a causal link between vaccinations and autism, the completely fabricated idea that vaccinations cause autism is commoner now than it has ever been.

Meanwhile, Wakefield retains his title as "doctor" and is executive director at the Thoughtful House Center for Children, a center that focuses on autism research. Truly appalling.
 

B_spiker067

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I wonder what the motivation to fake the science was? I wonder what other science isn't so much faked as say compromised and what would be the motivation for that?

I think too many people invest a certain kind of faith in science, almost as if it were a religion. Examples like these pop up all the time and beg people to think for themselves; to be more scientifically minded rather than just pop consumers.
 

tripod

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I wonder what the motivation to fake the science was? I wonder what other science isn't so much faked as say compromised and what would be the motivation for that?

I think too many people invest a certain kind of faith in science, almost as if it were a religion. Examples like these pop up all the time and beg people to think for themselves; to be more scientifically minded rather than just pop consumers.

Did you hit your fucking head before you typed this?

There is nothing wrong with science. the drug industry is based on money not science... just because some douchebag drug execs came down hard on some researchers and made them falsify the data does not mean that there is something wrong with science.

There is nothing really scientific about these drugs... most of them are just placebos with harmful side effects. I'll take a shot of Penicillin if I need it (infected tooth or something) but I don't trust the "for profit" medical industry of the United States. Most health workers have only a cursory knowledge of how the body works in a holistic way. Of course, I am generally healthy and my heart goes out to anyone who needs medical attention.

I do however, take tons of supplements... herbs and what not.

This is also just the fake data that was found out. To match spiker's suspicions... how many other drugs have had their efficacy results faked and or the dangerous side effects of the drug deemed somehow safe?

If you've ever spent time with some pharmaceutical reps you will find that they are some of the most unethical, money grubbing and hard partying people that you have ever met... it's like they hopped straight from the mortgage industry to big pharma.
 

tallmanluke

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I despise the prescription drug industry.

Take Oxycontin for example. Anyone here live in the Tampa/St Pete area? If you have, you know what I'm talking about. Blues. Damn.
 
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That's terrible, because taking the wrong thing can have awful, destabilising effects on ppl.

I took effexor/venlafaxine about 5 yrs ago, and went into this horrible depression. Prozac was well better for me :)

Having said that - i know ppl effexor has worked for as an anti-depressant - and also prozac doesn't work for everyone.

You have to be careful tho - and faking data when ppls health/lives are at risk, is pretty bad. (maybe financial pressure to gain licenses for different uses for each drug, led unscrupulous ppl to try and prove stuff they thought would work - but didn't have evidence for?..)