The fate of abstracts submitted to a cancer meeting: factors which influence presentation and subsequent publication.

Abstracts that are published in the proceedings of meetings receive minimal peer-review, but may be referenced or used to make decisions about management of patients. We have studied factors which influence the probability of acceptance for presentation, and of subsequent publication of articles, from abstracts included in the Proceedings of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO). From a random sample of 197 abstracts submitted to the 1984 meeting, 81 were accepted for presentation and a Cancerline computer search revealed 103 papers that were published subsequently in peer-reviewed journals. Communication with authors of the remaining abstracts led to identification of 12 additional articles that had been published. Major reasons for non-publication were insufficient priority or lack of time, funds or other resources. Abstracts which reported 'positive' results were more likely to be presented than those reporting 'negative' results (60% vs. 35%, p = 0.03) and to lead to subsequent publication (74% vs. 32%, p = 0.0001). Of the 81 abstracts in our sample that were selected for presentation at the meeting, 63 (78%) led to publications, compared to 45% (52/116) of those not selected (p = 0.00001). There were no significant differences in the frequency of citation of abstracts that did or did not lead to subsequent publications. We made detailed comparisons of abstracts and subsequent papers for 18 randomized phase III trials. For 15 studies (83%), there was good correlation between the conclusions of the article and of the abstract.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Chronic B-cell lymphocytosis.

Persistent elevation of lymphocyte counts is usually associated with a malignant monoclonal lymphoproliferative disease. Over the last 8 years, amongst patients investigated in our center for undetermined persistent lymphocytosis, a diagnosis of malignant lymphoproliferation was excluded in 6 cases as studies of surface membrane immunoglobulin light chains showed that they presented a polyclonal expansion of their B-lymphocyte pool. All patients were young-to-middle aged women presenting peculiar immunohematologic findings characterized by 1) persistent (2-7 yr) elevation of lymphocyte counts (4-14 x 10(9)/l), 2) presence of characteristic binucleated B cells on peripheral blood smears, 3) a normal bone marrow histology, 4) a polyclonal increase of serum IgM with low-to-normal IgG and IgA levels. Histologic examination of the spleen in 2 patients and lymph nodes in 1 showed a benign follicular lymphoid hyperplasia. The evolution was benign in every case. We suggest that chronic polyclonal B-cell lymphocytosis is a distinct clinicopathologic entity that should not be confused with malignant lymphoproliferative disorders.