Editors' pick 2013

Themed issues

This Journal continues to publish a mix of original research and review articles on ‘all aspects of drug action in man’ in categories identified by the authors, sometimes grouped into themed issues or sections. The first themed section of 2013 was on ‘nutraceuticals’ – a term that has caused some dismay among purists, representing as it does a field awash with marketing hype for products that are chemically incompletely defined and with little, and very often no, scientific basis. Nevertheless there is an emerging body of evidence to support the therapeutic use of several such products and we recall that the founding fathers of pharmacology were prepared to use incompletely characterized extracts of spleen, prostate or fungus (e.g. ergot) to probe physiological function and to advance therapeutics. We explored this young branch of our discipline in this collection of articles. We wished in particular to highlight that an evidence-based approach to such products, underpinned by good science, can make important contributions to public health, in addition to, not instead of, pharmaceutical therapies – see for example 1.