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Letters to the Editor

Reply to D’Errico et al.

IRCCS Policlinico San Donato, Divisione di Cardiochirurgia II, Via Morandi 30, 20097 San Donato Milanese, Milano, Italy

Received 28 April 2008; accepted 29 April 2008.

^_* Corresponding author. Tel.: +39 0252774514; fax: +39 0252774327. (Email: menicanti{at}libero.it).

Key Words: Coronary artery bypass • Risk-adjustment • EuroSCORE • Health care quality assessment • Outcome research

The letter of D’Errico et al. [1] deserves a short comment.

I completely agree with the authors that the Italian CABG Outcome Project was developed with the ‘enthusiastic cooperation of a significant number of Italian cardiac surgeons’ and I was one of this group; my hospital was the greatest contributor to this study.

Unfortunately due to the bias that were present in the study as is described in my Editorial [2,3] the enthusiasm disappeared, and D’Errico forgets to mention in her letter that the Italian Society of Cardiac Surgery denied the sponsorship to the study.

Once again in D’Errico's letter the bad quality of the data it is not considered and the issues arisen by the Editorial [2] are not approached.

It is surprising that the authors complain about the fact that somebody can disagree, particularly when the disagreement is supported by paper published by outstanding research group [4]. I want to remind them that in a serious scientific journal it is normal procedure to stimulate the discussion by searching for a bias present in a paper. Nobody can impose on the Editor to publish or refuse a paper and so far I have not had the power to ‘prevent’ the publication of any paper. It is a completely different situation from a publication in normal newspaper where the authors have a very easy access without any criticisms.

References

1. D’Errico P, Seccareccia F, Fusco D, Perucci CA. Eur J Cardiothorac Surg 2008;34:468-469.[Free Full Text]
2. Menicanti LA. Editorial: the surgeon, the statistics and the data. Eur J Cardiothorac Surg 2008;33:323-324.[Free Full Text]
3. Menicanti LA. Editorial comment. Eur J Cardiothorac Surg 2006;29:62-63.[Free Full Text]
4. Shahian DM, Normand ST. Comparison of ‘risk-adjusted’ hospital outcomes. Circulation 2008;117:1955-1963.[Abstract/Free Full Text]

This Article Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Personal Folders Download to citation manager Author home page(s): Lorenzo A. Menicanti Permission Requests Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Menicanti, L. A. Search for Related Content PubMed Articles by Menicanti, L. A. Related Collections Coronary disease