Index of 2010
Senator Grassley's report on ghostwriting
Those who follow developments on ghostwriting in the medical literature will be aware that US Senator Charles Grassley has been an outspoken critic of the practice. He has just released a report into his 2 years of inquiries into medical ghostwriting.
Continue reading→Worrying scientific illiteracy among our elected representatives
Thanks to the wonders of Twitter, I have just found out (via @bengoldacre and @DrEvanHarris) that one of our esteemed elected representatives, David Tredinnick MP, has tabled 3 Early Day Motions singing the praises of homoeopathy.
Continue reading→Papers from the past
I am thrilled to see that the latest issue of The Write Stuff, the journal of the European Medical Writers Association is now published. It is always a fascinating read for those of us involved in medical writing, and although I haven't yet got very far with the current issue, I'm sure it will be no exception. It certainly has some fascinating looking things in its table of contents, and I am thoroughly looking forward to reading it over the coming weekend.
Continue reading→A new record in biomedical publishing?
I have just had a paper rejected from a journal so quickly that I think I may have set a new speed record. Continue reading→Toothbrushing and cardiovascular disease
Today's health story of toothbrushing and cardiovascular disease shows an association, not causation. Health journalists: please try to learn about the difference. Continue reading→New training dates announced
We are pleased to be able to confirm the dates for our next public training courses in medical writing. Our 1-day introductory course will be on 17 September, and our 2-day course for healthcare professionals will be on 28-29 October. Continue reading→Sausages, steaks, and socioeconomic status
A story in the news today tells us that sausages (and indeed other kinds of processed meats) increase your risk of cardiovascular disease, whereas steaks (and other forms of unprocessed read meats) do not. This is based on a study published in Circulation, which rather annoyingly, is behind a paywall, so I haven't read the full paper. The study was done at the Harvard School of Public Health, and shame on them for not making their research freely available in an open-access journal.
Continue reading→EMWA conference, day 4
Well, the EMWA conference is all over now, and I am safely back in London, having cunningly dodged the ash cloud by a rather small margin on both my outward and return journeys.
The final day of the conference began with a plenary lecture about the importance of compliance with promotional codes, such as that by the ABPI, when writing materials that could be used for promotional purposes. One of the great challenges in this area is that codes are not harmonised across countries, so material that might be perfectly compliant in the UK might fall foul of the code in Germany, for example, or vice versa. Definitely an area with many pitfalls for the unwary.
Continue reading→EMWA conference, day 3
It's been a busy day at the EMWA conference today (well, technically yesterday now) without a spare 5 minutes to update the blog until now.
The day began at 8 am with a plenary lecture on knowledge and information management. Some good hints and tips there, especially for the knowledge management wiki that we've recently set up at Dianthus.
Continue reading→EMWA conference, day 2
Day 2 at the EMWA conference has been considerably less busy for me than yesterday. My only engagement today was attending a short seminar this morning on Web 2.0 for medical writers. Plenty to think about, with tools such as blogging, social networking, and Twitter becoming ever more a part of our lives (well, you're reading this blog, aren't you?)
Continue reading→