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| LETTER TO EDITOR |
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| Year : 1999 | Volume
: 47
| Issue : 2 | Page : 144-145 |
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Importance of coding of drugs under investigation in research articles
HN Madhavan
Vision Research Foundation, 18 College Road, Chennai - 600 006, India
Correspondence Address:
H N Madhavan
Vision Research Foundation, 18 College Road, Chennai - 600 006
India
 Source of Support: None, Conflict of Interest: None  | Check |
How to cite this article:
Madhavan H N. Importance of coding of drugs under investigation in research articles. Indian J Ophthalmol 1999;47:144-5 |
| Dear Editor: | |  |
This is with reference to the letter of Dr. Mohan Raj Nair on "contaminated irrigasol solution"[1] in which he has made certain reference to our earlier article "Effects of viscoelastic ophthalmic solutions on cell cultures".[2] I wish to state that the above two articles can not be compared. The contaminated irrigasol solution was a fact whereas effects of viscoelastics on cell cultures were original experimental findings. This major difference should be understood before any comparison is made.
Responsible research workers would wish their new findings validated by other workers. Until then, the publication of their findings should not be the cause of irreparable damage to individuals. In fact, the editorial board of the journal did wish to know the reasons for coding the viscoelastics before our article was published and accepted our reasons given below.
- 1. The emphasis of our paper was on the important finding of use of HeLa cell line for the cytotoxicity test of viscoelastics. This is an original research finding.
- 2. We have been testing batches of viscoelastics since then and the results have been reproduced perfectly several times in our laboratory. In all these experiments, the technicians and other investigators are always masked to the brand of viscoelastics.
- 3. We believe that this method of cytotoxicity testing may be among the best that can be carried out for the viscoelastics. In our opinion the findings merit publication so that other scientists could verify and/or duplicate them.
- 4. Currently, we do not want to decode the viscoelastics that are tested. We prefer several other workers also to carry out similar investigations to substantiate the efficacy of this method.
It should also be understood that the results of quality assurance tests may vary across batches. A failure of a batch of a product on quality testing by a trial method not yet accepted uniformly should not lead to condemnation of the entire brand.
Inquiries for decoding of the viscoelastics, from several ophthalmologists including Dr. Mohan Raj Nair from different parts of the country were received after the publication of our article in March 1998. My reply, including that to Dr. Nair had been the same as given to the editorial board. Ophthalmologists of our institute also are not aware of the brand names of the viscoelastics used in this experimental work.
I do hope the above clarifications would help in understanding the scientific value of our work and, if possible, verify our conclusions.
| References | | |
| 1. | Nair RM. Contaminated irrigasol solution. Indian J Ophthalmol 1999;47:53.  |
| 2. | Madhavan HN, Roy S. Effects of viscoelastic ophthalmic solutions on cell cultures. Indian J Ophthalmol 1998;46:37-40. [ PUBMED] |
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