In reply: The road to consensus: considerations for the safe use and prescribing of COX-2-specific inhibitors

In reply: Both Vitry and Hurley and Gazarian and Kaye would have had our consensus group address different or broader issues than safe prescribing and use of COX-2-specific inhibitors (CSIs). Indications for use, leakage and cost effectiveness are important issues, but our goal, clearly stated in our article,1 was different and, we believe, important: if a clinician has decided to use a CSI, what considerations are needed to prescribe the drug safely? Disagreements in reaching consensus were not, as suggested by Gazarian and Kaye, due to confusion about the aim of the exercise, but to differences in interpreting evidence and expressing conclusions in simple and direct terms. It would have been easy to avoid these problems by limiting participants to a small group of like-minded colleagues, but we chose to involve a broad range of people who may represent a more realistic spectrum of attitudes and approaches.