Research
Research overview
Reports of a "revolutionary drug" appear almost every week, and the urge to find out where to get it is understandable. But between a promising lab experiment and a medicine at the pharmacy lie years of testing, and many candidates drop out along the way. Here is how to tell what stage the reported product is at, and what to do with the news.
Encouraging news is the start of a conversation with your doctor, not a call to action. Good studies state their own limitations; bad headlines never do.
What a research stage means
| Stage | What is being found out | What it means for patients |
|---|---|---|
| Laboratory data | Whether the substance has an interesting effect | Still only a hypothesis; too early to talk about treatment |
| Phase I | Safety in a small group of people | Effectiveness has not yet been shown |
| Phase II | Effectiveness and choice of regimen | Results are preliminary; much may change |
| Phase III | Comparison in large studies | Grounds for a registration decision, but not registration itself |
| After registration (phase IV) | How the medicine behaves in everyday practice | Monitoring continues and information is refined |
How to break down a news story about a medicine
Find the original source
Who is reporting the results — the research team, a regulator, or a retelling of a retelling? The further a text is from the original work, the more distortion it contains.
Identify the phase
Words like "helps" and "cures" in a headline often refer to experiments on cells. Check who the work was done on and how many participants there were.
Check its status
In Russia, a medicine not entered in the State Register of Medicines cannot be in a legitimate pharmacy; elsewhere, check your national regulator. An offer to sell it is a red flag.
Take the question to your doctor
Save the link and ask at your appointment whether the news is relevant to your situation and whether it makes sense to look into clinical trials.
Signs of an unreliable report
- A promise of a complete cure with no caveats
- Not a word about the trial phase or the number of participants
- A link to order "that very medicine" right next to the news
- Claims that doctors or the government are "hiding" the discovery
- One patient's story instead of study results
Related sections
- How it works
How development, registration and oversight, manufacturing and storage of medicines work — without names or regimens.
- Questions
What to ask a doctor and pharmacist about prescribed treatment, a different package and taking part in trials.
- Sources
Which official materials the reference relies on, what it leaves out and why much of it is written in general terms.
Sources
- State Register of Medicines (Ministry of Health of Russia)
- WHO — substandard and falsified medical products
Information is current as of the preparation date. Rules for registering medicines and selling them at a distance change from time to time, so check the official registers — in Russia, those of the Ministry of Health and Roszdravnadzor; elsewhere, your national medicines regulator — and ask a doctor or pharmacist about treatment.