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Clinical trials

The silent minority—unpublished data on cancer care

From 1989 to 2003, 709 phase III trials evaluating systemic cancer treatment were presented at ASCO meetings. Tam and collaborators have now reported that 9% of these trials were never published, and 13% were published after a 5-year delay. More than half of these studies would have had clinical impact if published promptly.

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Acknowledgements

Supported in part by a grant from the Fashion Footwear Charitable Foundation of New York/QVC Presents Shoes on Sale.

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D. F. Hayes declares he is a consultant for Biomarker Strategies and Chugai Pharmaceuticals and he receives research funding from Novartis, Pfizer and Veridex LLC. He also owns shares from Oncimmune. He has two pending patents regarding the use and development of assays for circulating tumor cells.

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Hayes, D. The silent minority—unpublished data on cancer care. Nat Rev Clin Oncol 8, 631–632 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrclinonc.2011.148

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