Press Releases Saturday 3 October 1998
No 7163 Volume 317
Please remember to credit the BMJ as source when publicising
an
article and to tell your readers that they can read its full text on
the
journal's web site (http://www.bmj.com).
If your story is posted on a website please include a link back to
the source BMJ article (URLs are given under titles).
(1) BULLYING
IN SCHOOLS: WHO ARE THE VICTIMS AND
WHO ARE THE PERPETRATORS?
(2) CASES
OF EYE MALFORMATIONS IN BABIES HIGHER IN
RURAL AREAS
(3) US HEALTH
IS WORSE IN STATES WITH LARGER INCOME
INEQUALITIES
(4) DOCTORS AND PATIENTS SHOULD CO-SIGN PRESCRIPTIONS
(5) THE EUROPEAN
MEDICINES EVALUATION AGENCY:
OPEN TO CRITICISM
(1) BULLYING IN SCHOOLS:
WHO ARE THE VICTIMS
AND WHO ARE
THE PERPETRATORS?
(Bullying in schools: self reported
anxiety, depressions and
self esteem in secondary school
children)
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/317/7163/924
Bullied children tend to be the younger pupils in secondary schools.
They are more anxious than their peers, whilst bullies themselves
tend to be more depressed than other children. So say Dr Salmon
and colleagues from the Warneford Hospital and the Institute of
Health Sciences, Oxford in this week�s BMJ.
In their study of 904 pupils aged 12-17 years, the authors report
that bullying intervention strategies seem to be helping the situation,
but that they seem to be more successful among boys rather than girls.
They conclude that these factors could be important for future
intervention policies.
Contact:
Dr Tony James, Consultant in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry,
Highfield Adolescent Unit, Warneford Hospital, Oxford
email: Tony.James{at}oxmhc-tr.anglox.nhs.uk
Tony.James{at}oxmhc-tr.anglox.nhs.uk Tony.James{at}oxmhc-tr.anglox.nhs.uk
(2) CASES OF EYE MALFORMATIONS
IN BABIES HIGHER
IN RURAL AREAS
(Geographical variation in anophthalmia
and microphthalmia
in England, 1988-94)
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/317/7163/905
In early 1993 the media reported alleged clusters of children being
born without any eyes (anophthalmia), or with very small eyes
(microphthalmia) and suggested that these cases might be linked to
exposure to a pesticide. In a paper in this week�s BMJ
Dr Helen
Dolk and colleagues from the London School of Hygiene and
Tropical Medicine report the findings of their study of all such cases
in England between 1988 and 1994.
They found that there was very little evidence to support the presence
of any strongly localised environmental exposures, for example to
pesticides, causing clusters of children to be born with anophthalmia
or microphthalmia. However, they are concerned that children from
rural areas are twice as likely to suffer from this condition than
those
born in areas with a high population density. They conclude that this
association needs further investigation.
Contact:
Dr Helen Dolk, Senior Lecturer, Environmental Epidemiology Unit,
Department of Public Health and Policy,
London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London
(3) US HEALTH IS WORSE
IN STATES WITH LARGER INCOME
INEQUALITIES
(Income distribution, socioeconomic
status and self rated health
in the United States: multilevel
analysis)
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/317/7163/917
Inequalities in health associated with socioeconomic status are large,
but aren�t necessarily explained solely by the fact that some people
have high income and some do not, say Dr Bruce Kennedy et al from
the Harvard School of Public Health in the United States in this week�s
BMJ. Based on their research conducted in all 50 states,
the authors
found that the effects of state income distribution was also important.
The theory that those with low income have poorer health is unsurprising;
however, Kennedy and colleagues have found that in states where
inequalities in the distribution of income are large, even those in
the middle
income groups rate their health as poorer than middle income earners
in
states with a more equitable income distribution. The authors conclude
that social and economic policies that affect income distribution may
have
important consequences for the health of the population.
Contact:
Dr Bruce Kennedy, Deputy Director, Division of Public Health Practice,
Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, USA
email: kennedy{at}hsph.harvard.edu
kennedy{at}hsph.harvard.edu kennedy{at}hsph.harvard.edu
(4) DOCTORS AND PATIENTS SHOULD CO-SIGN PRESCRIPTIONS
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/317/7163/951
Patients do not always take the full course of the tablets they are
prescribed and sometimes doctors are not sure of what patients
really want, say Dr Joe Colllier and Professor Sean Hilton who have
written a letter in this week�s BMJ. They say that to
resolve this
mismatch and improve the chances of treatment success and eliminate
waste, patients and prescribers should discuss in detail the treatment
options before the prescription is written.
If the process is equitable, patients should indicate their responsibility
by signing their own prescriptions as well as their doctor, dentist
or
nurse. They say: "The adoption of this concordance model for the
relationship between patient and prescriber should ensure that decisions
on prescribing are made jointly, with both parties in agreement and
with
responsibility shared."
Contact:
Dr Joe Collier, Reader and Consultant in Clinical Pharmacology or
Professor Sean Hilton, Professor of General Practice,
St George�s Hospital Medical School, London
email: jcollier{at}sghms.ac.uk
jcollier{at}sghms.ac.uk jcollier{at}sghms.ac.uk
(5) THE EUROPEAN MEDICINES
EVALUATION AGENCY:
OPEN
TO CRITICISM
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/317/7163/898
In an editorial in this week�s BMJ Dr Kamran Abbasi, Assistant
Editor
of the BMJ and Dr Andrew Herxheimer, of the UK Cochrane
Centre,
argue that the European Medicines Evaluation Agency (EMEA) needs
an independent and more thorough system of data collection and
appraisal so that doctors and patients can have greater confidence
in
the drug licensing system. The authors say that the present system
of
withholding information deemed to be commercially confidential
(sometimes as little as one per cent of the information about a product
that the agency holds is released into the public domain) strengthens
manufacturers� commercial interests at the expense of public confidence.
In the European Union, drugs may be licensed in three ways. The centralised
procedure allows applications to be made direct to the EMEA so that
drugs
can be made available throughout the European Union. Alternatively,
companies can apply to national licensing authorities, which ensure
that
product licences granted in one country receive mutual recognition
in other
member states. Lastly, if a product is to be marketed in a single country,
an application can be made to the licensing authority of that country
under
a national procedure.
Contact:
Dr Kamran Abbasi, Assistant Editor, BMJ,
Tavistock Square, London WC1H 9JR
email: kabbasi{at}bmj.com
FOR ACCREDITED JOURNALISTS
Embargoed press releases and articles are available from:
Public Affairs Division
BMA House
Tavistock Square
London WC1H 9JR
(contact Jill Shepherd;jshepher{at}bma.org.uk)
and from:
the EurekAlert website, run by the American Association for the
Advancement of Science
(http://www.eurekalert.org)
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