BMJ  2005;331:1423 (17 December), doi:10.1136/bmj.331.7530.1423

News

Journal criticises Vioxx study for omitting three heart attacks

Janice Hopkins Tanne

New York

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

The New England Journal of Medicine has issued an editorial "statement of concern" about the omission of data in a paper it published. It said that three heart attacks were omitted from a study comparing rofecoxib (Vioxx) with naproxen, under-stating the risks of rofecoxib.

The editorial by the journal's three top editors will appear in print in the 29 December issue but was published online on 8 December (www.nejm.org, doi: 10.1056/NEJMe058314).

It said: "Relevant data on cardiovascular outcomes had been deleted from the VIGOR [Vioxx gastrointestinal outcomes research] manuscript prior to its submission to the journal and... the authors had withheld data on other relevant cardiovascular outcomes. The evidence has raised questions about the integrity of the data on adverse cardiovascular events in the article and about some of the article's conclusions."

Patients in the VIGOR trial had three more heart attacks than were reported (New England . . . [Full text of this article]


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