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Christmas and Moncada raise an interesting issue. Indeed, at 12 weeks, diclofenac sodium was no longer superior to acetaminophen or to placebo (P = .25, analysis of variance). This confirms the "eyeball" test of the Figure (panel A). Nevertheless, the drop in pain elicited by diclofenac at 2 weeks persisted at 12 weeks (P = .002, t test). However, at 12 weeks, by the "eyeball" test again, both the acetaminophen and placebo groups also demonstrated a drop in pain that was not present at 2 weeks, though neither was statistically significant by the t test (P = .13 and P = .42 for acetaminophen and placebo, respectively). We believe that this represents regression to the mean¹ and is an argument in favor of performing future, larger, placebo-controlled studies of acetaminophen as we stated in the text. We do not believe that the title should have . . . [Full Text of this Article]

John P. Case, MD; Algis Baliunas; Joel A. Block, MD
Chicago, Ill

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