Tom MacDonald replies to Marisa de Andrade

doi:10.1136/bmj.b4281

Published 21 October 2009, doi:10.1136/bmj.b4281
Cite this as: BMJ 2009;339:b4281

Letters

Response: Tom MacDonald

Tom MacDonald replies to Marisa de Andrade

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

Thank you for allowing me to respond to Ms Andrade’s articleabout the Standard Care versus Celecoxib Outcome Trial (SCOT).¹

SCOT was designed by me with Professor C J Hawkey (NottinghamUniversity) and Professor Ian Ford (Glasgow University). Theprotocol is the property of Dundee University (the study sponsor)and was formally approved by the European Medicines EvaluationAgency (EMEA), as well as other regulatory bodies. The aim ofthe study is to assess the long term drug safety of non-steroidalanti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) and is funded by Pfizer USA.In general the pharmaceutical industry does not see such safetystudies as attractive commercially, which is why SCOT is ledby an independent investigator (me) and managed by an academicsteering committee.

The meeting served several functions: education about the toxicityof NSAIDs (the meeting was accredited by EPASS (EducationalProviders Accreditation Scheme (Scotland)); training in trialmethods; a description . . . [Full text of this article]

Tom MacDonald, professor of clinical pharmacology¹

¹ Ninewells Hospital and Medical School, University of Dundee, Dundee DD1 9SY

tom@memo.dundee.ac.uk