Discover and read the best of Twitter Threads about #esketamine
Most recents (2)
“In recent years, under steady pressure from the pharmaceutical industry and the patient groups it funds, the F.D.A. has progressively lowered its standards of effectiveness and safety required for drug approvals.” via @nytopinion @akesselheim nytimes.com/2021/06/15/opi…
“…reached a low point last week when the F.D.A. approved aducanumab, a treatment for Alzheimer’s disease that has not been convincingly shown to work and can cause brain swelling and hemorrhage.”
“more than half of new drugs are now approved based on what’s called surrogate endpoints — changes in the body measured by lab tests that may not reflect clinical benefit — rather than requiring that the drug affect how a person feels, functions or survives.”
1/ National Institute for Health & Care Excellence does not recommend #esketamine to treat #depression bc effectiveness unclear (low quality trials), problematic economic model (short-term treatment, depression lasts long). Cost/benefit not sufficient to recommend treatment.
3/ Agreed that published literature is low quality. Samples are generally too small to draw inferences from the samples to the population; there are recent studies without placebo groups (how does that even get funded in 2020); when placebo groups exist, they are often not >>
