"The value of animal experiments for predicting the effectiveness of treatment strategies in clinical trials has remained controversial, mainly because of a recurrent failure of interventions apparently promising in animal models to translate to the clinic," say authors in a Research in Translation piece published in PLoS Medicine this week. The PLoS Medicine magazine article by H. van der Worp (University Medicine Centre Utrecht) and colleagues discusses the controversies and possibilities of translating the results of animal experiments into human clinical trials.
Related research, published in PLoS Biology, shows how selective reporting of medical research carried out on animals may be creating a false impression of how effective drugs might be. A team of researchers, led by the University of Edinburgh, say this is because medical journals are more likely to publish positive results that highlight medical advances than negative or neutral findings, which are deemed less interesting.
Can animal models of disease reliably inform human studies? by van der Worp et al (published in PLoS Medicine).
Citation: Citation: van der Worp HB, Howells DW, Sena ES, Porritt MJ, Rewell S, et al. (2010) Can Animal Models of Disease Reliably Inform Human Studies? PLoS Med 7(3): e1000245. doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.1000245
Funding: This work was supported in part by the MRC Trials Methodology Hub and the National Health and Medical Research Council. The funders played no role in the decision to submit the article or in its preparation.
Competing Interests: Malcolm R. MacLeod is on the Editorial Board of PLoS Medicine.
IN YOUR COVERAGE PLEASE USE THIS URL TO PROVIDE ACCESS TO THE FREELY AVAILABLE PAPER: http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pmed.1000245
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Publication Bias in Reports of Animal Stroke Studies Leads to Major Overstatement of Efficacy by Sena et al (published in PLoS Biology).
Citation: Sena ES, van der Worp HB, Bath PMW, Howells DW, Macleod MR (2010) Publication Bias in Reports of Animal Stroke Studies Leads to Major Overstatement of Efficacy. PLoS Biol 8(3): e1000344. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1000344
Funding: We acknowledge financial support from the Scottish Chief Scientists' Office. MRM acknowledges the support of the Edinburgh MRC Trials Methodology Hub. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
Competing Interests: The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
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