Bad Pharma 2013 – a great succes

bad pharma skype

300 students reading one book, summarising it contents and discussing three propositions in order to grasp the essence of the book. This might sound a bit boring perhaps…But what if it Goldacres book Bad Pharma, you only have to read 30 pages and still get the content of the complete book, and get to Skype with the author? Great fun!

And we weren’t the only who had fun: Ben Goldacre addressed 300 students, all with critical questions, and apparently he enjoyed the whole debate:

We also invited AV, a spokesperson of NEFARMA an organisation who represents most pharmaceutical companies in the Netherlands. With him we discussed whether the AllTrials campaign was a waste of time and money. Also, BB  a reporter from the Mare, who has knowledge on conflict of interest of professors joined in on the discussion whether professors should declare their COI before each lecture. All in all, it was a great day in which some of the students were shocked by the message of Ben Goldacre, whereas other students were not impressed and doubted whether there view is too one-sided… The debate still continues!

Bad Pharma Symposium on the front page of Mare

Mare 2013 11 28 Bad Pharma  - front pageThis week, the Mare decided to run a story on Bad Pharma book by Ben Goldacre and our related symposium. The author, BB did an outstanding job in describing the argument Goldacre brings forward in his book. As you might know, we are organising a symposium for our 300 students that are following our course “academic and scientific training”, because I believe that doctors should learn about their field that they will graduate in once they have graduated. A quote from me in the Mare (in Dutch)

Dokter zijn gaat verder dan alleen het behandelen van één patiënt. Onze beroepsgroep heeft een bijzondere positie in de samenleving; mensen leggen letterlijk hun leven in je handen. Naast je arts-patiëntrelatie heb je ook te maken met de wetenschap, beleidsmakers en de farmaceutische industrie. Aankomende artsen moeten daarvan bewust worden en goed op de hoogte zijn van de ontwikkelingen in hun veld. Dit boek sloeg de spijker op zijn kop.

one little error slipped in… I am not a doctor and therefore it is officially not ‘onze beroepsgroep’ but i think people will grasp the point that I try to make. The complete article can be read here.