To the Editor: I was pleased to see the issue of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) after breast cancer raised by Del Mar and colleagues in a recent issue of the Journal.1 However, I was a little disappointed to see that Australian research in this area had been "missed" by their search.2,3 There are a number of other studies that I am aware of which would suggest to me that perhaps their search technique was not particularly thorough.4-7
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- 1 Allamanda Medical Centre, Southport, QLD.
- 2 Mater Medical Centre, South Brisbane, QLD.
- 1. Allen IE, Olkin I. Estimating time to conduct a meta-anlaysis from number of citations retrieved. JAMA 1999; 282: 634-635.
- 2. Del Mar CB, Silagy CA, Glasziou PP, et al. Feasibility of an evidence-based literature search service for general practitioners. Med J Aust 2001; 175: 134-137.
- 3. Girgis S, Ward JE, Thomson CJH. General practitioners' perceptions of medicolegal risk. Med J Aust 1999; 171: 362-366.
- 4. Levinson W. Physician-patient communication. A key to malpractice prevention [editorial]. JAMA 1994; 272: 1619-1620.
- 5. Brewer EC. Dictionary of phrase and fable. Philadelphia: Henry Altemus, 1898; Bartleby, 2000.