If the results of an article are noteworthy, read the entire article; do not rely on the abstract alone

Abstract

Clinicians typically update their knowledge by reading articles on the Internet. Easy access to the articles' abstracts and a lack of time to access other information sources creates a risk that therapeutic or diagnostic decisions will be made after reading just the abstracts. Occasionally, however, the abstracts of articles from clinical trials that have not obtained statistically significant differences in the primary study endpoint have reported other positive results, for example, of a secondary endpoint or a subgroup analysis. The article, however, correctly reports all results, including those of the primary endpoint. In the abstract, the safety information of the experimental treatment is usually deficient. The whole article should be read if a clinical decision is to be made.

Keywords: Abstracts; Articles; Artículos; Biases; Clinical decision; Clinical trials; Comunicación de resultados; Decisión clínica; Diagnosis; Diagnóstico; Dissemination of results; Ensayos clínicos; Resúmenes; Sesgos; Spin; Tratamiento; Treatment.