Read the COMPare papers:

  • A prospective cohort study correcting and monitoring 58 misreported trials in real time
  • Qualitative analysis of researchers’ responses to critical correspondence on a cohort of 58 misreported trials

COMPare

Tracking switched outcomes in clinical trials

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Tracking switched outcomes in clinical trials

Outcome switching in clinical trials is a serious problem. Between October 2015 and January 2016, the COMPare team systematically checked every trial published in the top five medical journals, to see if they misreported their findings. We are now submitting the first set of findings from the project as an academic paper, summarising the quantitative results, and the themes of responses from journal editors and trialists in collaboration with a qualitative researcher. Prior to publication, cite our data and methods as per the reference at the bottom of this page. This is our workflow:

  1. We compared each clinical trial report with its protocol or registry entry. Some trials reported their outcomes perfectly. For the others, we counted how many of the outcomes pre-specified in the protocol or registry were never reported. We also counted how many new outcomes were silently added.
  2. When we detected unreported or added outcomes, we wrote a letter to the journal pointing them out. We tracked which journals published our letters – and which did not.

Here’s what we found.

trials checked
trials were perfect
outcomes not reported
new outcomes silently added

On average, each trial reported just loading…% of its specified outcomes. And on average, each trial silently added loading… new outcomes.

letters sent
letters published
letters unpublished after 4 weeks
letters rejected by editor

Learn why we did this this, more about our methodology, or see the full results for every trial.

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How to cite us

Prior to publication of the first paper on COMPare, please cite this project as:

The COMPare Trials Project. Goldacre B, Drysdale H, Powell-Smith A, et al. www.COMPare-trials.org, 2016.

Or alternatively:

The COMPare Trials Project. Ben Goldacre, Henry Drysdale, Anna Powell-Smith, Aaron Dale, Ioan Milosevic, Eirion Slade, Philip Hartley, Cicely Marston, Kamal Mahtani, Carl Heneghan. www.COMPare-trials.org, 2016.

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