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Ibuprofen-Parkinson’s Study: Few News Organizations Report On It Accurately

We’re delighted to see that USA Today, Reuters, and WebMD were among the news organizations that included what an editorial writer said about an observational study linking ibuprofen use with fewer cases of Parkinson’s disease. All three news organizations used some version of what editorial writer Dr. James Bower of the Mayo Clinic wrote or said:

“Whenever in epidemiology you find an association, that does not mean causation.”
“An association does not prove causation.”
“There could be other explanations for the ibuprofen-Parkinson’s connection.”

Kudos to those news organizations. And some praise goes to the journal Neurology for publishing Dr. Bower’s editorial to accompany the study. His piece is entitled, “Is the answer for Parkinson disease already in the medicine cabinet? Unfortunately not.”

And unfortunately not all news organizations got that message. Because many don’t read the journals, so they certainly never get to the editorials. Instead, they rewrite quick hits off a wire service story. As a result, we end up with some of the following:

A FoxNews.com story was particularly deaf to Bower’s caveat, stating: “That bottle of ibuprofen in your medicine cabinet is more powerful than you may think.”

A CBSNews.com story never addressed the observational study limitation, instead whimsically writing: “Pop a pill to prevent Parkinson’s disease? A new study says it’s possible, and the pill in question isn’t some experimental marvel that’s still years away from drugstore shelves. It’s plain old ibuprofen.” Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Gary Schwitzer's HealthNewsReview Blog*

Healthcare PR Puffery: A Year-End Review

Healthcare journalists are buried under a mountain of public relations material sent to them every day of every week of every month. I don’t even work in a traditional news setting, yet I’ve made it onto the distribution lists of countless PR people.

The picture on the left shows a pile of video news releases sent to one TV health news reporter over a relatively short time span.

Here’s my year end look at just some of what was sent to me this year. Imagine what the New York Times, USA Today, the TV networks, and others receive.

I get countless emails from PR people offering interviews with their experts on:

• Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) — including an offer of an interview with a “celebrity trainer” who claims to have trained Julia Roberts, Cindy Crawford, Jennifer Aniston, Claudia Schiffer, and Kim Kardashian. (Were they all SAD?)

• A leading NY dermatologist invited me to “sip on champagne” and sample his new “daily nutrition for skin” cream.

• “For the more than 50 million Americans suffering from frequent heartburn, the thought of Halloween celebrations can truly be scary.”  — PR for NYC gastroenterologist who is also consultant to makers of a heartburn drug. One of his tips: “Don’t just stock up on treats, prep your medicine cabinet” with the proton pump inhibitor of the company for whom he consults. Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Gary Schwitzer's HealthNewsReview Blog*

Retraction Watch: A New Niche Blog To Follow

Ivan Oransky, M.D., executive editor of Reuters Health, somehow found time a few months ago to launch his first blog, Embargo Watch — with the tagline: “Keeping an eye on how scientific information embargoes affect news coverage.”

Now, as evidence he either doesn’t sleep or has roots in Transylvania, Oransky the Impaler launches a new blog, Retraction Watch along with partner Adam Marcus. Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Gary Schwitzer's HealthNewsReview Blog*

Latest Interviews

IDEA Labs: Medical Students Take The Lead In Healthcare Innovation

It’s no secret that doctors are disappointed with the way that the U.S. healthcare system is evolving. Most feel helpless about improving their work conditions or solving technical problems in patient care. Fortunately one young medical student was undeterred by the mountain of disappointment carried by his senior clinician mentors…

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How To Be A Successful Patient: Young Doctors Offer Some Advice

I am proud to be a part of the American Resident Project an initiative that promotes the writing of medical students residents and new physicians as they explore ideas for transforming American health care delivery. I recently had the opportunity to interview three of the writing fellows about how to…

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Latest Book Reviews

Book Review: Is Empathy Learned By Faking It Till It’s Real?

I m often asked to do book reviews on my blog and I rarely agree to them. This is because it takes me a long time to read a book and then if I don t enjoy it I figure the author would rather me remain silent than publish my…

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The Spirit Of The Place: Samuel Shem’s New Book May Depress You

When I was in medical school I read Samuel Shem s House Of God as a right of passage. At the time I found it to be a cynical yet eerily accurate portrayal of the underbelly of academic medicine. I gained comfort from its gallows humor and it made me…

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Eat To Save Your Life: Another Half-True Diet Book

I am hesitant to review diet books because they are so often a tangled mess of fact and fiction. Teasing out their truth from falsehood is about as exhausting as delousing a long-haired elementary school student. However after being approached by the authors’ PR agency with the promise of a…

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