One of the most highly-cited journals in cardiology has retracted a paper less than a month after publishing it in response to criticism first posted on Twitter.
The article, “Short-term and long-term effects of a loading dose of atorvastatin before percutaneous coronary intervention on major adverse cardiovascular events in patients with acute coronary syndrome: a meta-analysis of 13 randomized controlled trials,” was published online January 3 in the European Heart Journal (EHJ). Its authors purported to analyze clinical trials of patients who were given a loading dose of atorvastatin, a cholesterol medication, before undergoing cardiac catheterization.
How closely the study authors adhered to their own methods came under question on January 8, when Ricky Turgeon, a cardiology pharmacist, posted a series of tweets in which he claimed some of the studies included in the analysis either did not test the drug in patients undergoing the procedure — referred to as PCI — or patients had not all been diagnosed with acute coronary syndrome, commonly known as a heart attack. With many of the trials included in the analysis not abiding by the predefined inclusion criteria, the study’s conclusions are unreliable, argued Turgeon.