Last week, I wrote about the correction made to the “Highlights” section of the paper reporting the long-term follow-up results for the GETSET trial. (The trial was conducted by Professor Peter White, one of the three lead PACE investigators, and colleagues.) I noted that this correction was not indicated or identified—a fact I attributed to the ambiguous status of “Highlights” sections, which could be viewed as more like news headlines than part of a paper’s core text.
But I was wrong—the official notice of a correction, called a corrigendum, has now appeared. For whatever reason, the correction itself was made before the corrigendum was posted. And unlike corrigendi that just state what was corrected, this one provided something of an explanation. Here is the full text:
The authors regret that they did not submit a revised highlights statement, when resubmitting their paper, in the light of revisions made to the final article. The revised highlights include a new statement, which reads: “There were no differences between interventions in primary outcomes at long-term follow up”. This is a substitute for: “Guided graded exercise self-help (GES) may lead to sustained improvement in fatigue.” The authors also made a minor correction to another highlight, which now reads: “The study showed that GES probably was cost-effective”.
The revised highlights are as follows:
• There were no differences between interventions in primary outcomes at long-term follow up.
• There was no evidence of greater harm after GES compared to specialist medical care at long-term follow-up.
• The study showed that GES probably was cost-effective.
• Most patients remained unwell at follow up; more effective treatments are required.
The authors would like to apologise for any inconvenience caused.,,,,,,,,,,
**********
