BMJ  2006;332:549-550 (4 March), doi:10.1136/bmj.332.7540.549-b

Letter

Offering results to research participants

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

EDITOR—The distinction between giving a general summary of trial results to study participants and providing them with their own trial results is not made clear in the paper by Dixon-Woods et al or the accompanying editorial.^{1 2} Investigators may provide patients with a summary of the trial results, but even if they do not they should be aware that study participants may access these results elsewhere. The provision of personalised trial results, and in particular treatment allocation (unblinding), is quite a different matter and much debated.^{3 4} This is the more likely of the two to result in emotional consequences for the participants.

In a large scale study of cardiovascular disease prevention in older patients conducted over five years,⁵ we pledged at the outset to provide all study participants with a lay summary of the general study results on the same day that the results were to be published, which . . . [Full text of this article]

Clinical Trials Unit, Glasgow Royal Infirmary, Glasgow G4 0SF eleanor.dinnett@ctunit.co.uk

Clinical Trials Unit, Glasgow Royal Infirmary, Glasgow G4 0SF

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