Open access: remember the limitations of abstracts and the role of professional endorsement | The BMJ

"In my discipline (e-health literacy), I often find myself debating whether abstracts being freely available to patients is of any real benefit. For researchers and clinicians, abstracts are a great timesaver—enabling a “flick-through” of the copious amounts of new articles for timely follow up. They may also be used by treating physicians and healthcare teams as a starting point for treatment planning and research. But abstracts are not designed to be an independent pathway to inform health decisions for patients lacking the appropriate professional expertise and health literacy skills...."

[Is this an argument against OA for abstracts, or for OA to full-text articles?]