Are these data real? Statistical methods for the detection of data fabrication in clinical trials

I read with interest the above discussion of Benford's Law as a route
to assessing fraud in clinical data. Whilst most data from clinical
trials may not be suitable for assessment by Benford's Law (as Prof Evans
notes), readers may be interested to know that a paper has recently been
published showing that Benford's Law can be used to screen other types of
analytical data -
http://www.rsc.org/publishing/journals/AN/article.asp?doi=b504462f .
Benford's Law has the great advantage over other statistical techniques,
involving the mean and standard deviation, that one has prior knowledge of
what answer to expect from the test, i.e the Benford distribution is a
property of data in general, whilst other statistical distribution are
properties of the particular data set. However for Benford’s Law to be
useful as a screening technique the data being examined must, as a rule of
thumb, span at least four orders of magnitude; a criterion which I suspect
would not be met for most sets of clinical data?

Competing interests:
None declared