News Release

Annals of Internal Medicine Tip Sheet, September 18, 2001

Peer-Reviewed Publication

American College of Physicians

Annals of Internal Medicine is published by the American College of Physicians-American Society of Internal Medicine (ACP-ASIM), an organization of more than 115,000 internal medicine physicians and medical students. The following highlights are not intended to substitute for articles as sources of information. For an embargoed fax of an article, call 1-800-523-1546, ext. 2656 or 215-351-2656.

Medical Journals Join to Strengthen Requirements for Manuscripts Editors of 12 peer-reviewed, general medical journals in the United States, Canada, Europe and Australia announced a new requirement for manuscripts describing sponsored research (Editorial, p. 463). In response to the growing role of pharmaceutical companies in conducting research, the editors will require authors of manuscripts to disclose full details of their role and any sponsor's role in the design of the study, analysis of the results and the decision to publish. Many of the journals will refuse to publish articles based on studies in which a sponsor controls the data or can withhold publication of the findings. The editors say that a submitted manuscript is the intellectual property of its authors, not of the study's sponsor. The new standards appear in a revised section on publication ethics in the "Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Bio-Medical Journals" (http://www.icmje.org), developed by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. The joint editorial and revised requirements are being published in the 12 journals this month.

Drug Helped Ex-Smokers Stay Smoke-Free

Bupropion, an antidepressant also used to help smokers quit, was more effective than placebo in helping quitters continue not to smoke, a two-year study found (Article, p. 423). After a group of smokers took bupropion for a year, those who quit were assigned to one of two groups. The group that continued to take the drug for 45 more weeks was more successful at not smoking than the group taking a placebo (55.1 percent of the bupropion group remained smoke-free; 42.3 percent of placebo group remained smoke-free). After the bupropion group stopped taking the drug, the quit rate of both groups fell to about 40 percent.

Oral Drug for Cancer Patients with Fungal Infections Found as Effective as Standard, Intravenous Drug and Had Many Fewer Side Effects (Article, p. 412.)

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