Pharmaceutical giant Wyeth is under scrutiny for its practice of paying ghostwriters to draft scientific journal articles favorable to its products and publishing them under the names of academic researchers. Some of the ghostwritten reports involve Wyeth’s hormone replacement therapy, Prempo, and deny the results of a federal study that linked the drug to an increased risk for breast cancer. The inquiries come as part of the Senate Finance Committee’s examination of “medical ghostwriting,” part of a broader probe into the influence of drug companies on the health-care industry [Wall Street Journal].
The investigation is being spearheaded by Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, who last week sent a letter to Wyeth’s chairman requesting documentation of the company’s ghostwriting and publishing procedures. The letter [pdf] said Wyeth’s publications resembled “subtle advertisements rather than publications of independent research” and that “any attempt to manipulate the scientific literature, that can in turn mislead doctors to prescribe drugs that may not work and/or cause harm to their patients, is very troubling.” In response, a Wyeth spokesman accused Mr. Grassley of recycling old arguments and insisted that “The authors of the articles in question, none of whom were paid, exercised substantive editorial control over the content of the articles and had the final say, in all respects, over the content” [New York Times].
Posts Tagged ‘women’s health’
Senator: Drugmaker Wyeth Paid Medical Ghostwriters to Tout Its Products
Can Breast Cancer Tumors Vanish Without Treatment?
One in five breast cancer tumors may regress without treatment, a new study suggests. Researchers screening women who had a history of regular mammograms and those who did not report that those in the first group were diagnosed with 22 percent more breast cancers, implying that such a percentage of cancers would have eventually gone away on their own. The study opens up a controversial debate on whether early and aggressive treatment of breast cancer is always the best procedure. But many experts are wary of the new findings, saying the conclusions were incorrectly drawn and fearing they will discourage women from getting mammograms. “The idea that somehow these cancers go away entirely is, I would say, an intriguing hypothesis, but one we don’t have a lot of evidence to support,” [Reuters] said Dr. Eric Winer.
Researchers in Norway followed two groups of women, each numbering more than 100,000, for six years. The first group, monitored from 1992 to 1997, did not receive mammograms until the end of the study. (Mammograms were not common in Norway until 1996.) The second group, monitored from 1996 to 2001, received mammograms every two years. For every 100,000 women who were screened regularly, 1,909 were diagnosed with invasive breast cancer over six years, compared with 1,564 women who did not have regular screening [New York Times]—a difference of 22 percent. The researchers attribute this difference to the number of undetected tumors in the first group that vanished on their own during those six years.
Testosterone “Sex Patch” Could Boost Older Women’s Libidos
Dosing menopausal women with testosterone may be the key to helping those with low libidos get back in the mood, according to a new study. Proctor & Gamble Pharmaceuticals has published the results of a new trial of their testosterone patch, called Intrinsa, and say the results are encouraging for frustrated older women seeking a “Viagra for women.” However, nagging safety concerns are likely to keep the drug off the market in the United States for some time to come (although the drug is already on sale in Europe): During the new study, four of the test subjects using the patch developed breast cancer.
The 52-week study included 814 women with sexual desire disorder, characterized by troublesome low sexual desire or function…. The women were asked to keep sexual encounter diaries, and researchers used other established measures to assess sexual response during the six-month evaluation phase of the study. They found that compared to placebo users, the women who used the 300 microgram patch reported significant improvements in sexual functioning, including desire, arousal, orgasm, and pleasure [WebMD].
Nobel Prize for Medicine Awarded to Virus Hunters
Three researchers who discovered viruses that cause serious diseases have been awarded the Nobel Prize in medicine, the Nobel Foundation announced today. The prize was awarded jointly to France’s Francoise Barre-Sinoussi and Luc Montagnier, who worked together to identify the HIV virus that causes AIDS, and also to the German scientist Harald zur Hausen who discovered the human papilloma viruses that cause cervical cancer.
Barre-Sinoussi, who is the eighth woman to win the medicine prize since the first Nobel Prizes were handed out in 1901, worked with Montagnier to discover the HIV virus. Shortly after reports in the early 1980s of a new immunodeficiency syndrome, researchers all over the world raced to find the cause. The two [researchers] cultured cells from lymph nodes of patients. They first detected the enzyme reverse transcriptase, which meant that a retrovirus was active. Further searching turned up retroviral particles, which could kill white blood cells and which also reacted with antibodies from infected patients [Scientific American].
Viagra Helps Women Combat the Sexual Side Effects of Antidepressants
The little blue pills that have given so many men a sexual boost may be of some use to women as well. A small study looked at women whose sex lives had suffered as a side effect of taking antidepressants, and found that Viagra increased their sexual sensation and orgasms.
However, the pills didn’t boost the women’s sex drive, leading some experts to question whether the medication could help most women. “Viagra is not a desire drug. It dilates the blood vessels, allowing intercourse to occur,” said Rutgers University psychology professor Barry R. Komisaruk, an expert on sexual dysfunction. [Sexual health expert Leonard] Derogatis agreed: “The most prevalent female sexual dysfunction is not arousal but desire. Viagra doesn’t have a direct effect on that,” he said [Baltimore Sun].
Genetic Test Could Predict Breast Cancer Risk for Young Women
In a few years, young women may be offered a genetic test that would gauge their probability of developing breast cancer decades later. The test, which could be a simple mouth swab, could make women who are at high risk more vigilant and could lead them to detect the disease earlier, researchers say. But some doctors warn the results could cause serious psychological stress and would not identify all women at risk [Sydney Morning Herald].
Researchers know that a woman’s risk of developing breast cancer is based on both genetics and lifestyle. Currently, women with a strong family history of breast cancer are offered genetic screenings, but those tests only look for the rare genes BRCA1 and BRCA2, which have long been known to carry a high risk of the disease. The proposed tests, which researchers say are just a few years away, would also look at seven genetic variants… which have been discovered to increase a woman’s risk of breast cancer, particularly if she has certain combinations of them [The Guardian].
