There's another factor that points in the same direction: the pervasive presence of scientific fraud. It's very easy to rig a clinical trial to get whatever result you want, and there are dozens of ways to do it.
I'll start with my own experience here. When I was at college I did work-study in a laboratory run by a couple of professors who were doing research in a health-related field. They ran what were publicly claimed to be double-blind controlled studies. They weren't actually blinded at all. The actual work of assessing the data required judgment calls from grad students who knew perfectly well that their positions depended on getting results that supported the theory the professors favored. (We talked about it more than once.) Thus the research was completely fraudulent -- but it got ample grant money and media recognition, so nobody asked hard questions.
I've spoken to many other people who did the same sort of work-study grunt work in university laboratories, and nearly all of them have described the same general type of fraud -- part of a culture of pervasive dishonest that not only goes unpunished but receives ample rewards in terms of money, publicity, and influence. When somebody says "X was tested by an RCT," it's unsafe to assume anything other than "the manufacturer of X handed over money to a university lab and got the results they paid for."
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
branchandroot
Re: Randomized clinical trial
Date: 2025-04-15 04:14 pm (UTC)I'll start with my own experience here. When I was at college I did work-study in a laboratory run by a couple of professors who were doing research in a health-related field. They ran what were publicly claimed to be double-blind controlled studies. They weren't actually blinded at all. The actual work of assessing the data required judgment calls from grad students who knew perfectly well that their positions depended on getting results that supported the theory the professors favored. (We talked about it more than once.) Thus the research was completely fraudulent -- but it got ample grant money and media recognition, so nobody asked hard questions.
I've spoken to many other people who did the same sort of work-study grunt work in university laboratories, and nearly all of them have described the same general type of fraud -- part of a culture of pervasive dishonest that not only goes unpunished but receives ample rewards in terms of money, publicity, and influence. When somebody says "X was tested by an RCT," it's unsafe to assume anything other than "the manufacturer of X handed over money to a university lab and got the results they paid for."