Non-responders in clinical pharmacology - a commentary to a book review by D.N. Bateman

Abstract

The British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology has reviewed ‘A Guide to Training in Clinical Pharmacology in Europe’ compiled by Professor Kim Brøsen, published by Odense University Press, ISBN 87–7838–459–1 [1], and also available on the EACPT (European Association of Clinical Pharmacology) homepage: http://http://www.ou.dk/med/homepages/eacpt/eacpt5.html. Bateman notes that only about half of the European centres in clinical pharmacology have contributed to this first edition, the exact figure being 63% (Table 1). In the preface to the European guide, Michael Orme, honorary secretary of EACPT, and I write: ‘The guide aims to be comprehensive, and if it occasionally fails in that aim, the blame should not be attributed to the Danish office. In some cases it has proved remarkably difficult to persuade senior colleagues to describe their department for the benefit of future generations’. The editorial office was assisted by the national delegates of EACPT in each country in its attempts to get a complete picture of clinical pharmacology centres in Europe. Reminders by letters and telephone calls were often in vain. The compliance figures (Table 1) may reflect different attitudes to the importance of European collaboration but poor responders can still submit information about their centres to our homepage. Over all it is satisfactory that we now have a description of 148 training centres in clinical pharmacology in Europe. Our difficulties are similar to those being faced by organisers of international congresses and meetings in clinical pharmacology, who often complain about non-responders. Without a controlled study it is difficult to know whether this is a problem specific to Clinical Pharmacologists or, more likely perhaps, to the whole area of academic medicine. The increasing pressure on scientists, particularly in the overwhelming need to publish research in highly cited journals, is leading to a neglect of the more philanthropic aspects of academic life. Perhaps a way to reverse this decline would be to publish the names of ‘non-responders’ in the proceedings of our national and international meetings. This would serve as an early warning system for those colleagues who are involved in society orientated clinical pharmacology. I confess to having been a poor responder in the past, but after many years as chairman of EACPT I have been converted. To paraphrase a US President ‘Do not ask what Clinical Pharmacology can do for you but what you can do for Clinical Pharmacology’.