In order to emphasize the necessity for the research community to be more effective in supplying patients’ and professionals’ need for information, Sir Iain Chalmers, coordinator of The James Lind Initiative, used his lecture to state that currently health research strategies have large inefficiencies which result in failing to meet consumer’s needs of research results (patients and clinicians) effectively.

Worldwide, biomedical research receives more than US$100 billion in funding, generating an estimated 1 million research publications. Sir Iain argues that the current system shows inefficiencies that can be improved as follows:

  • clarifying the impact of new results on the overall evidence in relevance to the question addressed.
  • Only supporting new research that addresses significant uncertainties, which have previously been demonstrated in systematic reviews of existing evidence, as only then proposed new research will be ethical and potentially worthwhile.
  • People working within the healthcare system should have more access to research, with greater efforts being made to ensure patients and clinicians have easier access in findings related to their treatments, giving them more options and enabling them to make choices.
  • The scientific community should be responsible for publishing all well conducted studies that address important uncertainties, irrespective of the direction and strength of the results. Any biased under-reporting, whether on scientific or ethical grounds should not be tolerated.

Sir Iain Chalmers from The James Lind Initiative concluded:

“The ultimate outcome of all health research should be to improve patient health and wellbeing. When carrying out new research, resources should be allocated as effectively as possible to projects that will reduce important uncertainties and offer the public good returns on its investments.

Our work has shown that this is not the case currently and that there is still a large waste of resources in the way that health research is carried out and reported. There are a number of areas we have identified where this waste can be cut, including ensuring that patients and clinicians are consulted about their research priorities and that all findings of well-conducted research are published, regardless of direction and strength of results. Although there are admirable exceptions, the research community as a whole needs to examine the way it functions and move towards making research more accessible and accountable to the end-users – patients, clinicians and the general public.”

Written by Petra Rattue