Of care. BMJ 1999;319:527-8. (28 August.) 2 Royal College of Radiologists’ Clinical Oncology Information EPZ031686 price Network. Guidelines on the non-surgical management of lung cancer. Clin Oncol 1999;11:S1-53. 3 American Society of Clinical Oncology Clinical. Practice guidelines for the treatment of unresectable non-small-cell lung cancer. J Clin Oncol 1997;15:2996-3018. 4 Evans WK, Newman T, Graham I, Rusthoven JJ, Logan D, Shepherd FA, et al. Lung cancer practice guidelines: lessons learned and issues addressed by the Ontario Lung Cancer Disease Site Group. J Clin Oncol 1997;15:3049-59. 5 State of the Art Oncology in Europe: http:// www.cancereurope.net/start/web/home.cfmcare. The need for effective communication with patients is, however, highlighted and it is emphasised that care should be provided by a coordinated multidisciplinary team including specialist palliative care services.1 Watine and Ardizzoni et al have highlighted some of the differences between the COIN guidelines and similar American and European guidelines. It is important that guidelines for clinical practice are relevant to the context of those practitioners for whom they are intended. Important differences in evidence based guidelines are, however, a source of concern. The reason may be that they are derived from different evidence bases, there are differences in the interpretation of the outcomes, quality, or generalisability of the primary research, or there is insufficient evidence necessitating development of consensus guidelines. I agree with the suggestion that the development of common international multidisciplinary clinical guidelines would be helpful in further reducing inappropriate variation in treatment and improving patient care.Peter Simmonds senior lecturer in medical oncology Cancer Research Campaign, Wessex Medical Oncology Unit, Southampton General Hospital, Southampton SO16 6YD [email protected] Royal College of Radiologists’ Clinical Oncology Information Network. Guidelines on the non-surgical management of lung cancer. Clin Oncol 1999;11:S1-53.Consumer involvement in research is essentialEditor–We agree with Goodare and Lockwood that consumer involvement in the research process is lacking.1 Our work on osteoarthritis has shown the potential benefit of involving consumers when trying to prioritise the research agenda. In a survey of 112 people with osteoarthritis of the knee we found that a wider range of treatment options was being used by patients than the research literature would suggest. From a recent systematic review of the available literature on treatments for osteoarthritis of the knee (930 studies) research on physiotherapy, educational, and complementary treatments was relatively uncommon, at 3.5 , 6.5 , and 5.3 of all studies respectively. Altogether 93 (83 ) people responded to our questionnaire, not all of whom answered every question. Fifty two (63 ) reported that they had tried physiotherapy, 42 (53 ) had received educational interventions, and 18 (23 ) used complementary therapies. Thus the literature does not reflect the range of treatments used by patients. There are several reasons for this, but certainly one of them is a lack of consumer involvement in research priority setting (J Chard, unpublished findings). The wholesale inclusion of consumers in the research process may add to the time and cost of individual projects, but consumer involvement will greatly enhance the overall relevance of clinical research. It willBMJ.