BMJ  2004;328 (12 June), doi:10.1136/bmj.328.7453.0-g

Editor's choice

Do mistakes matter?

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Now hear this. Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs are better than opioids for relieving renal colic (p 1401). Now hear another thing. Enteral nutrition produces a quicker recovery from acute pancreatitis than parentral nutrition (p 1407). And another two. Epidural analgesia does not increase risk of caesarean section (p 1410), nor does H pylori eradication have any effect on heartburn or reflux (p 1417). But can you believe what you hear?

A study recently published on Biomedcentral (www.biomedcentral.com) found statistical inconsistencies in 38% of papers in Nature and 25% in the BMJ. Emili Garcia-Berthou and Carles Alcaraz examined a selection of manuscripts published in 2001 and concluded that these errors were "probably mostly due to rounding, transcription, or type-setting." Their verdict is that statistical practice is poor and that "quality of papers should be more controlled and valued." What isn't clear . . . [Full text of this article]

Kamran Abbasi, deputy editor

kabbasi@bmj.com


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Rapid Responses:

Read all Rapid Responses

Single Patient Based Medicine and Statistical Inconsistencies of Peer Reviews Papers.
Sergio Stagnaro
bmj.com, 11 Jun 2004 [Full text]
misuse of statistics in medical research
Tzippy Shochat
bmj.com, 11 Jun 2004 [Full text]
Can we believe what we hear ?
Abid Mahmood
bmj.com, 12 Jun 2004 [Full text]
Mistakes as a continuing learning paradigm?
Dr.Naseem A. Qureshi MD, IMAPA, LMIPS
bmj.com, 17 Jun 2004 [Full text]
Identifying and preventing statistical errors
Joan T McClusky
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BMJ statistical errors
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bmj.com, 19 Jul 2004 [Full text]
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