The WSJ Health Blog points to this item, courtesy of the Furious Seasons Weblog regarding this study
A new analysis of published data on the efficacy of the antidepressant Cymbalta in treating depression-related pain suggests the drug’s maker, Eli Lilly, overstates its claim that Cymbalta relieves physical as well as emotional pain.
Our curiosity piqued, we went to the study author, Glen Spielmans, an assistant professor of psychology at Metropolitan State University in Minnesota. He told the Health Blog he became intrigued by Lilly’s “Depression Hurts” campaign to market Cymbalta for depression-related pain.
He conducted a statistical review, or “meta-analysis,” of five published studies that looked at the relationship between duloxetine and reduction of pain symptoms in people with depression, published in this month’s issue of the journal Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics.
Spielmans, who does not receive drug industry funding, found only a tenuous relationship between Cymbalta and pain relief (the significance level was .057, while anything lower than .05 is usually considered significant). And the magnitude of the effect was .115, in the “very small” range.
“I think it’s certainly misleading at best, and completely false at worst,” Spielmans told the Health Blog of Lilly’s marketing of Cymbalta.
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