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Editors of medical journals take care of allegations of analysis misconduct, outlined by the Workplace of Analysis Integrity (ORI) within the U.S. as fabrication, falsification and plagiarism. Analysis misconduct threatens the validity of science, undermines belief in science and contributes to misinformation and disinformation about science.
In accordance with former editor-in-chief of the Journal of the American Medical Affiliation Howard Bauchner, MD, “it is necessary that editors have a clear and constant course of to take care of these allegations shortly and pretty. Journals are the general public conduit for analysis studies, assessment articles and opinion items and play an essential function in adjudicating analysis misconduct.
“It is important for all journals to have a policy which carefully defines research misconduct and lays out a consistent stepwise approach to deal with allegations of misconduct,” says Bauchner, professor of pediatrics at Boston College Chobanian & Avedisian Faculty of Medication.
In a commentary within the Journal of Legislation, Medication & Ethics, Bauchner and his colleagues describe the duties of editors to take care of allegations of misconduct.
They consider journals first want to find out whether or not the allegation is in step with analysis misconduct or might merely be an error requiring a correction or an change of letters to the editor. After these preliminary selections are made, they consider the allegation must be forwarded with as a lot element as doable to the corresponding creator.
Bauchner factors out that journals differ on whether or not the person making the allegation can stay nameless from each the journal and the creator(s). He believes that it’s best if the journal is conscious of who’s making the allegation, since it’s doable that people might have their very own biases, which might affect how the journal handles the allegation.
Bauchner acknowledges issues about how lengthy it typically takes some journals to retract manuscripts. This can be partially as a result of journals don’t routinely present deadlines to authors for a response or resulting from authors who select to not reply or are sluggish to answer queries about misconduct from a journal.
“Delays in retraction occur because authors can be unresponsive, disagree with the allegations, or request repeated extensions. Delays also occur because institutional integrity officers cannot be identified, or if they are identified, they also request extensions. Investigations can involve multiple authors, are sometimes quite complex, and can take months to conduct,” he says.
Bauchner stresses {that a} uniform definition of analysis misconduct throughout establishments and journals could be useful.
“We acknowledge how challenging developing such a definition would be, given the various opinions about some concepts of misconduct, for example, undeclared conflicts of interest. Regardless, journals should apply any definition of misconduct consistently, which is easier to do if the definition of misconduct is specific and detailed.”
Extra data:
Howard Bauchner et al, Analysis Misconduct and Medical Journals, Journal of Legislation, Medication & Ethics (2025). DOI: 10.1017/jme.2025.35
Offered by
Boston College Faculty of Medication
Quotation:
The function of journals in medical misconduct (2025, March 27)
retrieved 27 March 2025
from https://medicalxpress.com/information/2025-03-role-journals-medical-misconduct.html
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