Nursing journals are aiding and abetting the drug industry’s attempts to influence nurses’ prescribing, it has been claimed this week.

A report in PloS Medicine (2008;5:e5 doi: 10.1371/journal.pmed.0050005) notes that nurses now have greater power to choose products and services and to influence choices made by doctors and other clinical colleagues. As a result, say the New Zealand authors, Annemarie Jutel of Otago Polytechnic and David Menkes of the University of Auckland, nurses are now a “desirable target” for the industry.

However, they say, although medical journals have often criticised drug companies for exploiting patients and doctors through techniques …