The American Medical Writers Association (AMWA), the European Medical Writers Association (EMWA), and the International Society for Medical Publication Professionals (ISMPP) have recently highlighted a burning issue of retaining trust in pandemic-driven medical research. The experts of AMWA, EMWA and ISMPP said that the public could lose trust in science if scientific and medical researchers choose to bypass the traditional high standards of peer-reviewed medical journals in the rush to get research data released, particularly during crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic.
They have published a Joint Statement in the peer-reviewed journal Current Medical Research and Opinion (CMRO) – asserting that the integrity of published scientific and medical research must be protected. The statement argues that although peer-review is still the most common process for vetting scientific publications, there is a worrying trend for manuscripts to be released without pre-publication review.
Especially during the COVID-19 health crisis, medical researchers have felt significant pressure to publish COVID-19 findings as quickly as possible, but the statement emphasizes that having a pre-publication review is still essential. The danger is that once the threshold of publication oversight is lowered, it becomes a precedent that cannot be easily reversed, potentially eroding standards and causing the public to lose trust in medical science.
“Medical communicators, including writers, editors, and those involved in quality control, play a critical role in ensuring that clinical and scientific data are published and disseminated in an accurate and clear manner. In the current rush-to-publish environment, all stakeholders in the scientific and clinical research communities and press must ensure that the public have correct and actionable information from which to make health and medical decisions,” explained Gail Flores, Ph.D., President of AMWA.
In particular, the statement highlights the impact of preprints – preliminary scientific reports that are made publicly available online for anyone to read and discuss before they have been peer-reviewed. While preprints enable rapid release and discussion of data, many are never revised or corrected, and only about a third-to-a-half are ever fully published. This can also occur with articles submitted for post-publication peer review, in which an article is published in its original form before expert peer reviewers are invited to critique it.
The statement recognizes the benefits of rapid publication but alerts that they have to be vetted against the potential harms associated with an accelerated process.
“Particularly in these times, it is more important than ever to retain public trust in science, while balancing the need to report timely and relevant medical research,” stated Beatrix Doerr, Ph.D., President of EMWA.
In seeking a resolution, they present recommendations and a Reviewers’ Checklist to provide a minimum standard of pre-publication vetting to enhance preprint publication processes.
Key Recommendations
- Performing more extensive and consistent checks – for example, by preprint server hosts on articles that have not been peer-reviewed prior to publication.
- Referencing preprints and articles uploaded for post-publication peer-review only as in-text reference (with a preprint link, DOI, or both), rather than as a bibliographic reference, and clearly labeled as a preprint, or as undergoing post-publication peer review.
- Watermarking articles plus including a disclosure within the body of the article highlighting that the findings have not been formally peer-reviewed.
- Educating medical journalists and the public about the differences between preprints, post-publication peer review, and traditional peer review.
Crucially, they have also identified ways in which the peer-review process – renowned for being “laborious and time-consuming” – could be expedited. They call upon each stakeholder – authors, journal editors, and publishers – to play a part in this.
Key Suggestions
- Rapid response team of reviewers
- Standardized formatting requirements to shorten the time to re-submission
- Portable peer-review
- Fast-track options
- Incentives for reviewers
“For those engaged in preprints, post-publication peer-review, as well as traditional peer-review publications, our joint statement presents key practical recommendations to safeguard the quality of the publications while supporting their more rapid dissemination. We strongly encourage authors, journal editors, publishers, and other stakeholders to review and apply these practical suggestions, ensuring a high-quality standard for published research, irrespective of the format,” emphasized Robert J. Matheis, Ph.D., MA, President and CEO of ISMPP.
About AMWA: The American Medical Writers Association (AMWA) is a not-for-profit organization promoting excellence in medical communication and providing educational resources in support of that goal. AMWA’s over 4,300 members are committed to accurately and ethically making information about health and medicine clear and meaningful. www.amwa.org
About EMWA: The European Medical Writers Association (EMWA) is an association committed to representing, supporting and training medical communication professionals. It has more than 1,200 members from all over Europe and beyond, representing all sectors of medical writing. EMWA is a not-for-profit organization, run by its members for its members. www.emwa.org
About ISMPP: The International Society for Medical Publication Professionals (ISMPP) is a not-for-profit organization established in 2005, that exists to advance the medical publication and communication professions globally. ISMPP comprises more than 1,800 members, with representation from all stakeholders involved in the publication and communication of medical research. www.ismpp.org
Keywords:
AMWA, EMWA, ISMPP, Scholarly Publications, Pre-Prints, Peer-Review. Research Integrity, Public Trust
COMMENTS
Basically speaking, this is an issue of balance between fast dissemination and strict peer-review process, in particular during the pandemic period. Both the fast dissemination and the strict peer-review process are a must for any serious scholarly journals, but some sort of flexible policy should be applied, say, a timely online peer-review conference is organized to fast decide whether or not to accept those most urgent submissions, to publish those accepted articles online right away and to do the replacement for any later corrected versions. Fast dissemination should not be any excuse of abandoning strict peer-review, vital for the life and death of the scholarly journals
I realize the importance of peer review which builds the reputation of the journal. The joint statements of AMWA,EMWA and ISMPP is no different from that of ACSE and I agree 100% with all. However in this COVID19 pandemic, scientific community and medical community wished to share their findings for the benefit of deciding treatment strategies, which is based on diagnosis and experience, If they have shared this only means that No one has any experience to review such publications. it was always first time reporting data. Hence no issues were raised, because every paper published on COVID19 was first hand information. but at the same time we have be be judgmental about its ethics and authenticity. In peer review process we end up comparing the work of previous workers and make comparisons, but in this case there is no precedence. hence peer reviewing has been challenging due to lack of any previous reports.
Trust in public health officials and the information they provide is essential for the public uptake of preventative strategies to reduce the transmission of COVID-19. The initiative taken to get research data released, particularly during crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic is excellent. It would enable the people to get timely and authentic awareness of the panademic. Now when the entire world is been surrounded and affected by the panademic, such activity would surely be a sigh of relief.
This is a very important statement and I agree with it completely.
Indirectly related to publication is ethical review. I am concerned that in a pandemic, the standard of ethical review may have been lowered due to the rush to conduct research and publish. Hope that evidence on this point will be accumulated in the future.