Point 1: Sometimes a Greal Notion

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
The National Cancer Institute decided in May 1988 that results of certain breast cancer clinical trials were so compelling that physicians - and their patients-needed to be informed immediately. In advance of publication of these results in a peer-reviewed journal, NCI mailed a summary notice of the findings, called a Clinical Alert, to 13, 000 physicians, and shortly thereafter released the alert to the news media. Ferment ensued over the breach of tradition. In October 1989, NCI issued a similar statement, called an Update, on adjuvant therapy for colon cancer. NCI's clinical-alert policy is the subject of the first Point/Counterpoint - the Journal's new department that will, on occasion, present opposing views on timely and sometimes controversial issues. In this instance, John S. Macdonald, professor of medicine and director of Temple University Comprehensive Cancer Center, agreed to write Point; I. Craig Henderson, associate professor of medicine, Harvard University, and medical coordinator of DanaFarber Cancer Institute's Breast Evaluation Center, agreed to write Counterpoint. Macdonald, it should be noted, is a former director of the NCI Cancer Therapy Evaluation Program (CTEP). Accompanying the personal views of these writers is the NCI institutional view, a Point provided by Michael A. Friedman, current director of CTEP.

This publication has 0 references indexed in Scilit: