Can Medical Journals Be Trusted?

Medical journals are seen as one of the most reliable sources of current health research. These journals generally fuel most media (newspapers, TV news clips, blogs) reporting of weight and obesity issues.

However Dr Richard Smith, a former editor of the British Medical Journal has implied that journals are being undermined by reliance on the drug industry (via BBC News).

He said: "For a drug company a favourable trial is worth thousands of pages of advertising, which is why a company will sometimes spend upwards of a million dollars on reprints of the trial for worldwide distribution."

A similar statement could be made about some of the larger diet companies who allegedly have links into obesity studies.

It's easy to see a conspiracy wherever you look. The more you go searching for this kind of conflict of interest, the more you become what you behold.

I believe that sprinkled among many organizations there are individuals working with integrity. However financial pressures (or even plain old greed) can cause even the best of us to make dubious partnerships.

As Dr Smith is quoted as saying:

"An editor may thus face a frighteningly stark conflict of interest - publish a trial that will bring in $100,000 (£54,000) of profit, or meet the end of year budget by firing an editor."

Can we trust medical journals? Perhaps. But can we trust the conclusions that we draw?

Many Voices

Dairy is good for weight loss.
No it isn't.
Low-carb doesn't work.
Low-carb causes short-term weight loss.
Yo-yo dieting is a myth.
Yo-yo dieting is not a myth - it causes lowered metabolism.
Carbs are great - eat more of them.
Carbs are terrible and cause weight gain.
Alcohol is evil.
Drink red wine.
Eating fat makes us fat.
No, we need fat in our diet.
Diets don't work.
Any diet works - you just have to stick to it.

And so on, and so on...

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