CMAJ • November 20, 2007; 177 (11). doi:10.1503/cmaj.070652.
© 2007 Canadian Medical Association or its licensors
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Research

Research letter

The effect of publication on Internet-based solicitation of personal-injury litigants

David N. Juurlink, MD PhD, Laura Y. Park-Wyllie, PharmD MSc and Moira K. Kapral, MD MSc

From the Department of Medicine and the Clinical Epidemiology Unit, Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre (Juurlink); the Department of Family and Community Medicine, St. Michael's Hospital (Park-Wyllie); the Department of Medicine and the Clinical Epidemiology Unit, University Health Network (Kapral); and the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (Juurlink, Park-Wyllie, Kapral), Toronto, Ont.

Correspondence to: Dr. David N. Juurlink, Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, G Wing 106, 2075 Bayview Ave., Toronto ON M4N 3M5; fax: 416 480-6048; dnj{at}ices.on.ca

Serious adverse drug events can prompt personal-injury lawsuits. However, the extent to which biomedical publication regarding drug-induced harm can influence the legal process has not been well characterized. Using an advanced Google search strategy, we determined the number of Internet "hits" for websites soliciting plaintiffs for medicolegal action before and after publication of a study that highlighted the risk of dysglycemia among patients taking the antibiotic gatifloxacin. We found that early online release and print publication were associated with an immediate and sustained increase in the number of websites soliciting plaintiffs for legal action.




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