[Consequences of discrepancies between current data of the science and medical practice]

The target population for drug treatment is composed of all patients likely to benefit from it. It is defined on the basis of all the data collected during the clinical evaluation of the therapy (on the studied population). The dissemination population comprises those patients who are given the therapy once it has been released. Several surveys have shown that these two population do not coincide, although they should. The consequences of this gap can theoretically be measured. However, in order to do such an evaluation, we need relevant indices representing the consequences in terms of lack of expected benefit for the patients. We constructed models that represent the gap and its impact on life span and explored them by simulation. It came out that the consequences can be assessed in practice provided that outcome measurement technology is applied.