For your consideration;

1) The NIH announced last week that they were ending a multi-year study on blood pressure years early due to overwhelming evidence (see here in the NY Times). This has raised some criticism however, as without more information doctors cannot act on the findings. Physicians Eric Topol and Harlan Krumholtz called for medicine to move at a faster speed in a NY Times op-ed Don’t Delay News of Medical Breakthroughs on the NIH blood pressure study. The Incidental Economist Aaron Carrol expresses similar concerns here in a bit of a rant. Sarah Hedgecock gives an explanation and some examples from Twitter here on Forbes.

2) In the Chronicle of Higher Education,  Landmark analysis of an Infamous Medical Study Points out the Challenges of Research Oversight, co-authors of the recent re-analysis and the re-evaluation of Paxil as ineffective and unsafe for adolescents emphasize their work as a step toward creating a framework for similar reviews going forward. They believe that this requires access to patient level data from clinical trials.

Reports on mobile etiquette and mobile messaging and Health News Review’s recent picks of great writing on healthcare in this edition of Blog Buzz…

• For those interested in social media, mobile technologies and changing social norms, the Pew Research Center released two reports last month that are worth checking out. On August 19th, a report on Mobile Messaging and Social Media – which looks at various social media platforms, the growth of specific platforms, along with the demographics of users and their frequency of use – was released. On the 26th came Americans’ Views on Mobile Etiquette.

• Health News Review has a feature called Five Star Friday which highlights great news stories covering healthcare and related issues. Among other things, this week’s linked to Science Isn’t Broken by Christine Aschwanden, an older post that has gotten a good deal of attention and is worth a look. Other items in this roundup cover a building boom in cancer centers and a discussion on precision medicine.

In 2012, the British Library changed the way it ran it’s Document Supply operations – “to protect the library from claims of copyright infringement” – dramatically limiting how we ordered hard-to-find materials from them. Previously, the British Library was an incredible resource for otherwise impossible to locate information. Of course, this is a much bigger problem for independent researchers than for those at institutions without resources like MSK Library’s.  In Licensed to Fill?, Teresa Hackett shows the enormous impact of these changes have had on accessibility to information worldwide (including how it grew larger over the years) and argues that international document delivery should be protected by exemptions in copyright law.  The move at the British Library to a publisher licensing model drastically decreased access and prevented vital information from getting to those who need it.  I am glad to see this article and have a better understanding of the larger problem. Hat tip to @ALA_Carrie.

It may seem like a long time ago, but it has only been ten days since NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft provided us with stunning views of Pluto and the internet was suddenly filled with Pluto images and memes.  A few related items; On Wired, a roundup of the Pluto Science from New Horizons, from Space News special coverage of the Pluto Flyby. On the silly side of the coverage, xkcd had Pluto.