It is well known that negative studies are not published, and that, again, not only happens in industry, it also happens in academia. In academia, if you have an idea and you're married to your idea, you might be more likely to publish the positive findings as opposed to negative findings.

There's also been, I've also heard the excuse, I think, that journals will not publish negative studies; it's possible. Journals, of course, depend or like to have a big impact factor. Sometimes negative studies are important, but not always, and perhaps some journals will not publish as many negative trials as positive trials.

But I think that the field has addressed that, is addressing that in that there are now new electronic journals where negative studies are published. And, also, I think the field does not condone that anymore, and there's been examples out there that studies have not been published, but the field is not happy with that, and then they're published. I think things are changing for the good.

So let's acknowledge that it has happened, but let's also acknowledge that the sin is not unique to industry; it also happens with academia.

With a clinical trial registration there's no excuse: "Well, we didn't have time to publish" or "the journal rejected it". Clinical trial registration, every single study, positive or negative, is out there, so that I think is the best solution.

It's not enough, because you could argue, "Well, is every clinician, is every patient going to be looking at the clinical trial registration?" Some yes, some not, so I think the clinical trial registration I think is complemented, also, by the publication of negative studies, because when review papers are written or meta-analysis, investigators need all studies positive and negative. So I am optimistic that things are moving in that direction.