Research Methods
Primary sources: PubMed, the DOI, and the trial registry
Every summary on this site is supposed to be disposable. The paper, the DOI, and the registry record are the objects that should survive.
A literature journal earns trust by being easy to leave. If a sentence here is useful, the next click should land on the source, not on another page of ours.
Three different links
PubMed is the bibliographic record: title, authors, journal, abstract, and often a link to the full text or to PMC. The DOI is the publisher’s permanent address for the version of record, which is the PDF or HTML a citation should point at. ClinicalTrials.gov is where a study is described before, and sometimes after, a journal article exists. Those three can disagree in small ways. When they do, the journal article carries the analyzed results, and the registry carries the pre-specified plan. Read both for any trial you intend to quote in public.
Labels are a fourth source
For molecules that became drugs, the FDA label is the indication. A 2007 trial can be excellent and still be narrower than the way people use the generic name. Egrifta, Wegovy, Zepbound, and Vyleesi each have a label. Research peptides that never went through that process do not acquire a label by being written about.
A practical test
If a summary names a percentage and does not link the paper, do not reuse the percentage. If it names an approval and does not link the label or the agency database, check before you repeat it. This journal’s source box is meant to make that test easy.