Joel Dacks is an Associate Professor and Canada Research Chair in Evolutionary Cell Biology at the University of Alberta, a Scientific Associate at the Natural History Museum (London), and the current President of the International Society for Evolutionary Protistology. His research group studies the evolution and diversity of the eukaryotic membrane-trafficking system, from origins to potential disease therapeutics. In this interview, Joel shares some perspectives on gaining a balanced view of comparative cell biology and the importance of a constructive peer review process. My lab studies the evolution and diversity of membrane-trafficking organelles. Using genomics and molecular evolutionary techniques, with a focus on microbial eukaryotes (protists), we are examining the conservation in how material is moved around the cell and the ways in which different lineages across eukaryotes vary from the canonical configuration. This information tells us about the diversity of modern membrane trafficking mechanisms and function. It can also be used to understand the evolutionary processes and details of how the endomembrane organelles, and their associated molecular machinery, arose . CurrentThere has been a major community effort to produce tractable molecular cell biological model systems in the areas of the eukaryotic tree other than plants, animals, and fungi . I expeI think that the peer-review process is more important now than ever. With the vast amount of material available online that can be used to inform and mis-inform, a rigorous peer-review process is absolutely crucial since it is what sets scientific data apart from opinion backed by anecdotal facts. As well, we as a community rely on the good-will and sense of responsibility of our colleagues to keep the peer-review system working. My colleagues do this, and I feel a responsibility to contribute.My two best peer-review experiences, in retrospect though perhaps not at the time, were both rejections. The first was a rejection of a paper I submitted whilst in graduate school, where the editor told me that the result was interesting but that I needed to collect more data to test my interpretation of the findings that we had. But the next data that we collected were seemingly contradictory to the first! So we kept collecting and looking at different data points to bring into the study. Because we had to keep pushing and piece together data that were more complex than initially anticipated, we ended up coming up with a very different paper, one that laid the foundation for our proposed mechanism of how non-endosymbiotically derived eukaryotic organelles evolve. The second experience was quite recent. We had submitted our work to several high impact journals and received form-letter rejections. Finally, we got a rejection but with detailed and thoughtful criticism. It turned out that the reviewers were interpreting our paper in a way that I had not anticipated, prompting me to rewrite the entire manuscript to clarify our points. The next submission to a different high impact journal was completely straightforward and positive.http://www.chairs-chaires.gc.ca/chairholders-titulaires/profile-eng.aspx?profileId=2871.


Clinical and Experimental Dental Research included a somewhat optimistic vision that we hoped to count the journal as a prestigious scientific journal in dentistry and orofacial medicine within the next 5 years . Finally, two influential scientometric indices provide satisfactory marks for the journal, that is, SCImago  and Elsevier/Scopus  (https://www.scopus.com/sourceid/21100843003).Although today I would have chosen "trustworthy" rather than "prestigious," subtle signs are suggesting that we have reached this goal. The number of manuscript submissions that we received in 2018 doubled from the approximately fifty submissions received annually in the three previous years. It doubled again in 2019 , we adhered to their guidelines for ethical publication and tried our best to find a suitable peer‐reviewer COPE, .http://www.retractionwatch.com. I judge that open peer‐reviewing may perhaps be sustainable in academic societies with limited stakeholders, but risk becoming twisted out of all proportions if available publicly. I do, however, concur with the statement that it is high time that efforts and resources are allocated to promote scientific integrity via journal peer‐review data .A perceived threat with OA is the unfortunate industry labeled predatory publishing Jokstad, . Regretthttps://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/page/journal/20574347/homepage/editorialboard.html). A heartfelt thank you also goes to all colleagues who have responded to invitations to peer‐review for the journal. Your contributions to quality‐assure the published articles have been indispensable. Finally, thank you to all authors who choose Clinical and Experimental Dental Research as the vehicle for presenting your research. It has been an honor and a privilege to serve you.The efforts of managing the approximately 500 submissions received over these first 5 years have been facilitated by a phenomenal team of associate editors and a huge thank you is deserved (


Scientific writing and publication are essential to advancing knowledge and practice in public health, but prospective authors face substantial challenges. Authors can overcome barriers, such as lack of understanding about scientific writing and the publishing process, with training and resources. The objective of this article is to provide guidance and practical recommendations to help both inexperienced and experienced authors working in public health settings to more efficiently publish the results of their work in the peer-reviewed literature. We include an overview of basic scientific writing principles, a detailed description of the sections of an original research article, and practical recommendations for selecting a journal and responding to peer review comments. The overall approach and strategies presented are intended to contribute to individual career development while also increasing the external validity of published literature and promoting quality public health science. Publishing in the peer-reviewed literature is essential to advancing science and its translation to practice in public health ,2. The pDisseminating new knowledge via writing and publishing is vital both to authors and to the field of public health . On an iUnfortunately, prospective authors face barriers to publishing their work, including navigating the process of scientific writing and publishing, which can be time-consuming and cumbersome. Often, public health professionals lack both training opportunities and understanding of the process . To addrProspective authors need to know and tailor their writing to the audience. When writing for scientific journals, 4 fundamental recommendations are: clearly stating the usefulness of the study, formulating a key message, limiting unnecessary words, and using strategic sentence structure.To demonstrate usefulness, focus on how the study addresses a meaningful gap in current knowledge or understanding. What critical piece of information does the study provide that will help solve an important public health problem? For example, if a particular group of people is at higher risk for a specific condition, but the magnitude of that risk is unknown, a study to quantify the risk could be important for measuring the population’s burden of disease.Scientific articles should have a clear and concise take-home message. Typically, this is expressed in 1 to 2 sentences that summarize the main point of the paper. This message can be used to focus the presentation of background information, results, and discussion of findings. As an early step in the drafting of an article, we recommend writing out the take-home message and sharing it with co-authors for their review and comment. Authors who know their key point are better able to keep their writing within the scope of the article and present information more succinctly. Once an initial draft of the manuscript is complete, the take-home message can be used to review the content and remove needless words, sentences, or paragraphs.Concise writing improves the clarity of an article. Including additional words or clauses can divert from the main message and confuse the reader. Additionally, journal articles are typically limited by word count. The most important words and phrases to eliminate are those that do not add meaning, or are duplicative. Often, cutting adjectives or parenthetical statements results in a more concise paper that is also easier to read.Sentence structure strongly influences the readability and comprehension of journal articles. Twenty to 25 words is a reasonable range for maximum sentence length. Limit the number of clauses per sentence, and place the most important or relevant clause at the end of the sentence . ConsideBy using these tips and tricks, an author may write and publish an additional 2 articles a year.An author may write and publish an additional 2 articles a year by using these tips and tricks.The focus of the first sentence is on the impact of using the tips and tricks, that is, 2 more articles published per year. In contrast, the second sentence focuses on the tips and tricks themselves.Active voice: Authors who use the active voice write more clearly.Passive voice: Clarity of writing is promoted by the use of the active voice.The active voice specifies who is doing the action described in the sentence. Using the active voice improves clarity and understanding, and generally uses fewer words. Scientific writing includes both active and passive voice, but authors should be intentional with their use of either one.Authors should use the active voice whenever possible. Consider the following example:body of an article. Two additional components of all peer-reviewed articles are the title and the abstract. Each section’s purpose and key components, along with specific recommendations for writing each section, are listed below.Original research articles make up most of the peer-reviewed literature , follow Title. The purpose of a title is twofold: to provide an accurate and informative summary and to attract the target audience. Both prospective readers and database search engines use the title to screen articles for relevance , contextualize key results within the relevant literature, state the study limitations, and lastly, make recommendations for further research or policy and practice changes. Authors can support assertions made in the discussion with either their own findings or by referencing related research. By interpreting their own study results and comparing them to others in the literature, authors can emphasize findings that are unique, useful, and relevant. Present study limitations clearly and without apology. Finally, state the implications of the study and provide recommendations or next steps, for example, further research into remaining gaps or changes to practice or policy. Statements or recommendations regarding policy may use the passive voice, especially in instances where the action to be taken is more important than who will implement the action.The process of writing a scientific article occurs before, during, and after conducting the study or analyses. Conducting a literature review is crucial to confirm the existence of the evidence gap that the planned analysis seeks to fill. Because literature searches are often part of applying for research funding or developing a study protocol, the citations used in the grant application or study proposal can also be used in subsequent manuscripts. Full-text databases such as PubMed Central , NIH RePReview of the literature may continue while organizing the material and writing begins. One way to organize material is to create an outline for the paper. Another way is to begin drafting small sections of the article such as the introduction. Starting a preliminary draft forces authors to establish the scope of their analysis and clearly articulate what is new and novel about the study. Furthermore, using information from the study protocol or proposal allows authors to draft the methods and part of the results sections while the study is in progress. Planning potential data comparisons or drafting “table shells” will help to ensure that the study team has collected all the necessary data. Drafting these preliminary sections early during the writing process and seeking feedback from co-authors and colleagues may help authors avoid potential pitfalls, including misunderstandings about study objectives.The next step is to conduct the study or analyses and use the resulting data to fill in the draft table shells. The initial results will most likely require secondary analyses, that is, exploring the data in ways in addition to those originally planned. Authors should ensure that they regularly update their methods section to describe all changes to data analysis.After completing table shells, authors should summarize the key finding of each table or figure in a sentence or two. Presenting preliminary results at meetings, conferences, and internal seminars is an established way to solicit feedback. Authors should pay close attention to questions asked by the audience, treating them as an informal opportunity for peer review. On the basis of the questions and feedback received, authors can incorporate revisions and improvements into subsequent drafts of the manuscript.The relevant literature should be revisited periodically while writing to ensure knowledge of the most recent publications about the manuscript topic. Authors should focus on content and key message during the process of writing the first draft and should not spend too much time on issues of grammar or style. Drafts, or portions of drafts, should be shared frequently with trusted colleagues. Their recommendations should be reviewed and incorporated when they will improve the manuscript’s overall clarity.For most authors, revising drafts of the manuscript will be the most time-consuming task involved in writing a paper. By regularly checking in with coauthors and colleagues, authors can adopt a systematic approach to rewriting. When the author has completed a draft of the manuscript, he or she should revisit the key take-home message to ensure that it still matches the final data and analysis. At this point, final comments and approval of the manuscript by coauthors can be sought.Authors should then seek to identify journals most likely to be interested in considering the study for publication. Initial questions to consider when selecting a journal include:Which audience is most interested in the paper’s message?Would clinicians, public health practitioners, policy makers, scientists, or a broader audience find this useful in their field or practice?Do colleagues have prior experience submitting a manuscript to this journal?Is the journal indexed and peer-reviewed?Is the journal subscription or open-access and are there any processing fees?How competitive is the journal?Authors should seek to balance the desire to be published in a top-tier journal  against the statistical likelihood of rejection. Submitting the paper initially to a journal more focused on the paper’s target audience may result in a greater chance of acceptance, as well as more timely dissemination of findings that can be translated into practice. Most of the 50 to 75 manuscripts published each week by authors from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are published in specialty and subspecialty journals, rather than in top-tier journals .The target journal’s website will include author guidelines, which will contain specific information about format requirements , authorship criteria, article types, and word limits for articles and abstracts.We recommend returning to the previously drafted abstract and ensuring that it complies with the journal’s format and word limit. Authors should also verify that any changes made to the methods or results sections during the article’s drafting are reflected in the final version of the abstract. The abstract should not be written hurriedly just before submitting the manuscript; it is often apparent to editors and reviewers when this has happened. A cover letter to accompany the submission should be drafted; new and useful findings and the key message should be included.Before submitting the manuscript and cover letter, authors should perform a final check to ensure that their paper complies with all journal requirements. Journals may elect to reject certain submissions on the basis of review of the abstract, or may send them to peer reviewers  for consultation. Occasionally, on the basis of peer reviews, the journal will request only minor changes before accepting the paper for publication. Much more frequently, authors will receive a request to revise and resubmit their manuscript, taking into account peer review comments. Authors should recognize that while revise-and-resubmit requests may state that the manuscript is not acceptable in its current form, this does not constitute a rejection of the article. Authors have several options in responding to peer review comments:Performing additional analyses and updating the article appropriatelyDeclining to perform additional analyses, but providing an explanation Providing updated referencesAcknowledging reviewer comments that are simply comments without making changesIn addition to submitting a revised manuscript, authors should include a cover letter in which they list peer reviewer comments, along with the revisions they have made to the manuscript and their reply to the comment. The tone of such letters should be thankful and polite, but authors should make clear areas of disagreement with peer reviewers, and explain why they disagree. During the peer review process, authors should continue to consult with colleagues, especially ones who have more experience with the specific journal or with the peer review process.There is no secret to successful scientific writing and publishing. By adopting a systematic approach and by regularly seeking feedback from trusted colleagues throughout the study, writing, and article submission process, authors can increase their likelihood of not only publishing original research articles of high quality but also becoming more scientifically productive overall.


In my own words:In recent months, the University of California has gained significant attention for taking a strong stance in support of open access publishing of UC research as it negotiates new agreements with major journal publishers. Cambridge University Press has agreed, enthusiastically, to partner with UC in piloting this new model while, thus far, UC’s negotiations with Elsevier have resulted in a stalemate.The University of California has a long history of supporting open access. The UC Academic Senate adopted an open access policy in 2013, with the goal of ensuring that future research articles authored by faculty at all 10 campuses of UC will be made available to the public at no charge. In 2015 the Presidential Open Access Policy expanded this stance to include all other authors who write scholarly articles while employed at the University of California.As an academic librarian, my primary goal is to assist my community of faculty, students, researchers, and clinicians as they navigate the information life cycle, work to understand problems and create new knowledge. Open access is a business model that will ensure several outcomes in this regard. First, it allows the creators of information to maintain ownership of their most important asset, their intellectual property. Of equal importance, open access allows the public access to the information that they have paid to create. There is little research that does not have some form of public funding behind it, either explicitly through grants and other funding, or indirectly, through the labs, personnel, and other resources provided by state and federal funds. A third very important aspect of open access is that it provides a sustainable way for scholarly communication to take place.This last point merits some amplification. I have been fortunate to have spent my career in well-supported, research-intensive institutions. I started my career after the severe budgetary challenges of the early 1990s, and when the 2008 financial crisis hit, the institution at which I worked had the political will and funding to protect library budgets. While there have been a few instances where licensing or other issues meant that we’ve been unable to provide access to a certain product, I have never had to decline a faculty or student request for information based on financial reasons. True, I have had to say “wait” – for the new fiscal year, for another license to expire, for special funding to be approved – but I have not had to say “never.”But outside this rarefied and privileged world, information seekers and information professionals have to make dire choices all the time. I believe one of the most important aspects of my job is insulating my community from that harsh reality; indeed, a librarian’s job is to connect the users that we serve with all the resources that they need. Yet, for many libraries – as well as for many individuals and other organizations – the cost of accessing “pay-walled” articles, which still account for the vast majority of the scientific literature, is simply unaffordable.While some might cynically ask why folks not directly engaged in the research enterprise might need access to certain highly technical content, or why it is so crucial that this content be openly available, there are two answers. First, as alluded to above, as taxpayers everyone contributes to creating it, so everyone should be able to read it. A second, more subtle answer is suggested by a caller to a National Public Radio program focused on the UC/Elsevier negotiations. The caller was a community physician and she lamented the fact that paywalls often kept her from content that would assist her in patient care and professional development. So, the conversation is a bit more nuanced in that regard: It’s not just about “the average people on the street” but about the folks who need information to do their best to help them.For all the rhetoric about “transformative” scholarly communication in the University of California’s negotiations with Elsevier, the propositions being raised by the University are fundamentally conservative. We want UC authors to determine where and how they will share the intellectual property that they create, including where they will publish, what they will read, and what roles they will play in the editorial process.The last few weeks have provided great assurance that the University of California going forward will have agreements based on open access principles, including with Elsevier. Norway has reached an open access deal with Elsevier and the University has reached an open access deal with another important publisher, Cambridge University Press. In these models, which work on the principles of “pay to publish,” costs are contained and risks mitigated for both institutions and publishers, which will create a sustainable and open scholarly ecosystem.


Open Payments is a United States federal program mandating reporting of medical industry payments to physicians, increasing transparency of physician conflicts of interest (COI). Study objectives were to assess industry payments to physician-editors, and to compare their financial COI rate to all physicians within the specialty.Open Payments from August 1, 2013 to December 31, 2016. We reviewed general payments (“… not made in connection with a research agreement”) and research funding to “top tier” physician-editors of highly-cited medical journals. We compared payments to physician-editors and physicians-by-specialty. In 35 journals, 333 (74.5%) of 447 “top tier” US-based editors met inclusion criteria. Of these, 212 (63.7%) received industry-associated payments in the study period. In an average year, 141 (42.3%) of physician-editors received any direct payments to themselves including general payments and research payments, 66 (19.8%) received direct payments >$5,000  and 51 (15.3%) received >$10,000. Mean annual general payments to physician-editors was $55,157 . Median general payments to physician-editors were mostly higher compared to all physicians within their specialty. Mean annual direct research payment to the physician-editor was $14,558 . Mean annual indirect research funding to the physician-editor’s institution  was $175,282 . The main study limitation was difficulty identifying physician-editors primarily responsible for making manuscript decisions.We performed a retrospective analysis of prospectively collected data, reviewing A substantial minority of physician-editors receive payments from industry within any given year, sometimes quite large. Most editors received payment of some kind during the four-year study period. Given the extent of editors’ influences on the medical literature, more robust and accessible editor financial COI declarations are recommended. Open Payments program, also known as the Physician Payments Sunshine Act, is a federal program in the United States (US) under the Affordable Care Act that aims to increase transparency of physician conflicts of interest (COI) by providing information about medical industry payments to physicians and teaching hospitals.[Open Payments search tool[The ospitals. Drug andospitals. or risk ospitals. The Openarch tool providesarch tool This datarch toolOne group of physicians for whom COI are particularly relevant is physician journal editors who make decisions about which research manuscripts to publish, and thus play a major role in shaping medical knowledge and practice. Present nonspecific requirements regarding medical editor COI declarations by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors stand in strong contrast to more detailed and specific requirements by the same organization for declarations by authors which must accompany each paper published.Few studies have sought to clarify the degree and types of COI among editors of medical journals, with early studies focusing on whether editor COI were disclosed at all. Smith et al. found that in 2011, only three of the top ten peer-reviewed medical journals had public declaration of editor COI. Bosch etThere is a paucity of studies that examine actual industry payments to medical editors, and these existing studies have been based on voluntary data from editors rather than a broad inclusive database with mandatory reporting. Wong et al. surveyed 95 editors-in-chief of clinical medical journals in 2009 and found that 9% reported receiving $1,000 or more from industry in the past year.Open Payments data to specifically quantify financial COI among physician journal editors in prominent medical journals. We also compare financial payments to physician journal editors with existing research data on financial COI within the medical specialties of internal medicine, neurology, surgery, cardiology, psychiatry, pediatrics, and emergency medicine. We hypothesized that physician journal editors would have a non-negligible rate of financial COI though lower than the estimated rate among clinicians in the field, previously established using the same data source.[Our study uses a source.Open Payments search tool includes only physicians based in the US. Based on these inclusion and exclusion criteria, we chose the top five journals in total citations within each of the seven medical categories. A mini-Delphi technique was used among the authors to reach agreement in difficult cases.[Our goal in selecting journals was to aim for clinical specialties encompassing a variety of practices  and accounting for a large proportion of directly clinically relevant recommendations and conclusions. We identified the journals in 2015 with the highest number of citations as stated by the InCites Journal Citation Reports within tlt cases.We chose to use total citations rather than journal impact factor to identify journals for review; both are differing but legitimate means to identify top journals. Journal impact factor is often used as a measure of impact, but is purely a measure of citations per journal measured over a short recent time period. A particular paper in a high impact factor journal may be read by few and sometimes by none. Total number of citations of individual papers in other journals, especially over years, may be more indicative of dissemination to (and use by) a large universe of readers and researchers.We reviewed each journal’s masthead to identify a “top tier” of physician-editors judged to be senior within the editorial hierarchy, aiming to include editors most likely to be directly responsible for making manuscript decisions (not simply comments or suggestions). Mastheads had significant variability regarding editor titles. Informal query of a number of medical editors confirmed heterogeneity of practice across journals. There was thus no editorial board category listing that precisely identified editors who made decisions about manuscript acceptance, and those who did not, nor is this information listed on editorial mastheads.Mastheads do not clearly and systematically identify a “top tier” of physician-editors for each journal likely to be involved in manuscript decision-making. Surveys to obtain this information directly from editors and/or journals have had unreliably low response rates. ThereforInclude the editor-in-chiefInclude editors with titles containing “deputy,” “senior,” “executive,” “head,” “vice,” or “associate,” UNLESS they also have “assistant” in their titleExclude all editors with “assistant” in their titleExclude all “consulting” and “managing” editorsExclude all section or “specialty” editors UNLESS there are no higher-ranking editors (besides editor-in-chief) in which case all clinical section editors are includedExclude statistical, epidemiological, CME, and other non-clinical editorsExclude all non-US regional editorsExclude the “editorial board” or other similar “hanging committee” of consulting editors or committee members, UNLESS there are no higher-ranking editors (besides editor-in-chief) in which case the entire editorial board is includedExclude editors emeritus, guest editors, advisory editorsExclude non-physician editorsExclude physicians based at institutions outside the USOpen Payments search tool. August 1, 2013 to December 31, 2015 data were collected prior to the June 30, 2017 data release, whereas January 1, 2016 to December 31, 2016 data were collected after the June 30, 2017 data release.[For each physician-editor fulfilling inclusion criteria, we collected all available payments data using the 1) Total general payments from industry ,2) Total “direct” research payments (defined as “Payments where the company making the payment has named a physician as the primary recipient”), and3) Associated “indirect” research funding .We also collected data on any reported industry ownership or investment. We excluOpen Payments database does not include physicians that have no industry payments, all identified editors had their physician degrees  confirmed using a Google search to establish an accurate denominator. We used a recent observational retrospective study focusing on industry payments to physicians by specialty for comparison data.[Since the son data.Simple descriptive statistics were used for data analysis.This study was reviewed and approved by The Queen’s Medical Center Research & Institutional Review Committee, and qualified as exempt under the University of California, San Francisco Institutional Review Board.Out of 447 “top tier” editors of 35 journals, 333 (74.5%) met inclusion criteria as physician-editors based at a US institution . Of these, 212 (63.7%) physician-editors received industry-associated payments of any kind in the 41-month period. Averaging complete (12-month) 2014 to 2016 data, 139 (41.7%) physician-editors received general payments from industry per year, 19 (5.7%) received total “direct” research payments, and 60 (18.0%) received associated “indirect” research funding. Disputed payments represented a very small proportion of all transactions, with only 20 (0.1%) transactions  from 7 individuals totaling $138,152.76 over the 41-month period, and were excluded. Mean industry payments among physician-editors receiving payments are separated by type and year in Open Payment entries). Editors-in-chief were analyzed separately. A total of 35 editors-in-chief from 32 unique journals met inclusion criteria.  As a form of further sensitivity testing, for each payment type, analyses were performed for all qualifying physician editors-in-chief recipients of each payment type .Total payments of each type  averaging complete 2014 to 2016 data are detailed in Reported industry ownership and investment transactions were rare though prominent. The largest amount was a $12,736,276 declaration of stock ownership, held by an immediate family member. This made up the bulk of a total of $12,766,532 in three transactions reported over the 41-month period, all by a single individual.In order to analyze payments directly benefiting the editors, we performed a separate analysis combining the “general payments” and “total direct research payments” categories, but excluding the associated “indirect” research funding category in which payments were for the research institution. During the 41-month period, 100 (30.0%) editors received payments directed to themselves, not to their institution, of >$5,000 within a year. The threshold of $5,000 is designated by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) as a Significant Financial Interest (SFI). AveraginUsing the same data source, general payments received by physician-editors of specialty journals were compared to all physicians within that specialty, using data from a previously published study for the latter values in Open Payments federal program has, for the first time, allowed for reasonably complete transparency in financial COI among US physicians. In this study, we focused on COI among physician-editors at the top of the editorial hierarchy. A substantial minority of physician-editors receive payments from industry within any given year. However, over the 41-month study period, physician-editors directly or indirectly receiving industry payments of some kind represented a majority. In some cases, physician-editors have very large COI. Also, median general payments to physician-editors are mostly higher compared to all physicians within the specialty suggesting at the very least that physician-editors do not have a lesser degree of COI compared to their non-editor peers. This was an unexpected finding since journal editing is typically perceived as a non-commercial endeavor performed by academic physicians, preferably based on scientific evidence rather than other biases.The Open Payments data rather than the 2013 to 2016 period as with our present study.[One other study by Liu et al. examined industry payments to physician-editors as well, focusing specifically on 2014 nt study. Liu et aAdditionally and importantly, our study included both type of payments for research support provided in the database: directly to individual physicians, or to research institutions (rather than to a named physician). The latter was a category excluded from the BMJ study. We believe this category, which was larger than any of the others, was important to include. Although the physician-editor does not directly receive this money personally, it usually remains very beneficial to them  These funds are also valued by department chairs, deans, and the receiving institutions, and increase the prestige and influence of the editor-recipient, thus creating an important potential source of bias.Although the NIH has currently designated a $5,000 threshold as being a SFI , we were Our study had limitations. Though we aimed to target physician-editors primarily responsible for making manuscript decisions, we were unable to confirm each editor’s role, nor we could confirm whether editors worked part- or full-time in paid or unpaid editorial positions. Also, using our inclusion criteria for identifying handling editors within a journal’s masthead led to significant variability in the number of editors reviewed per journal. However, no standard system exists for distribution or identification of editorial roles, so we chose a conservative definition to focus attention on editors most likely to make manuscript decisions. Our analysis on editors-in-chief focused even more specifically on the group of editors with the highest level of decision authority within a journal who most likely participated in all acceptance decisions.Open Payments database in the past, including the vagueness of payment categories, low rates of physician and institutional review of data for accuracy, unresolved disputed records, and a paucity of contextual commentary.[There have also been critiques of the mmentary.,21 Data mmentary.Beyond deciding what gets published in medical journals , journal editors also decide who the peer reviewers are, which ones to use for a particular article, which articles are prioritized within a journal issue, and also determine the need for additional editorials or commentary, which might be pro or con the article’s conclusions. Presently at most journals, authors and reviewers are required to declare COI in detail, meaning that this precaution is expected for everyone involved in the peer review and publication process except the editors who make the key decisions. In any other setting, such a position would be considered to be very vulnerable to COI and perhaps the most important step in the process of preventing COI. At most journals, however, there is not a standardized approach or requirement for how or whether financial COI are reported to readers. Some journals have established criteria for editor recusal, though sStandards for declaration of financial COI among medical editors are presently poorly-defined in comparison to the vigorous requirements for declaration of COI by manuscript authors and CME presenters. Requiring full transparency in declaring financial COI among medical editors may be a reasonable first step in identifying potential conflicts, though one could argue that mere transparency is not sufficient. FinanciaBased on our study results that most editors are exposed to some direct financial COI, we recommend at the very least, a system of mandatory financial COI declaration for medical editors similar to that required of authors . Listing the COI of all editors somewhere in the journal cannot help the reader unless each published article names all editors who were involved in handling and decision-making for that particular manuscript, and declares whether they had COI related to the published study. This information could be published linked to the article itself for maximal transparency, and perhaps following the current International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) specific format that is already mandatory for authors. Finally, the most definitive but also disruptive and probably impractical remedy would be for editors to avoid taking any industry funds at all, removing this source of bias entirely.


Leishmania detection, which is especially relevant in chronic cutaneous lesion with lower parasite load. An accurate diagnosis is essential because of the high toxicity of the medications for the disease. Nevertheless, diagnosis of cutaneous leishmaniasis (CL) is hampered by the absence of a reference standard. Assuming that the PCR-based molecular tools are the most accurate diagnostic method, the objective of this systematic review was to assess the diagnostic accuracy of PCR-based molecular tools in a meta-analysis of the published literature.Molecular diagnostic tests, notably polymerase chain reaction (PCR), are highly sensitive test for A search of the published literature found 142 papers of which only 13 studies met the selection criteria, including conventional PCR, real-time PCR, Loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP), recombinase polymerase amplification (RPA), polymorphism-specific PCR (PS-PCR). The sensitivities of the individual studies ranged from 61% to 100%, and specificities ranged from 11% to 100%. The pooled sensitivities of PCR in smears were 0.95 , and the specificity was 0.91. In general population, estimates were lower in aspirates, skin biopsies and swab samples with 0.90  and 0.87  for sensitivity and specificity, respectively. The specificity was lower in consecutive studies, at 0.88  and its CI were wider.No statistically significant differences between the accuracy in smears, aspirate, skin biopsies or swabs samples were observed. Therefore, a simple smear sample run by PCR, instead more invasive samples, may be enough to obtain a positive diagnosis of CL. The results for PCR in all samples type confirm previous reports that consider PCR as the most accurate method for the diagnosis of CL. This systematic review and meta-analysis confirmed that PCR is the most accurate methods for the diagnosis of CL. The summary of the estimates for sensitivity and specificity in all readout methods of the index test were high. No statistically differences between the accuracy in smears, aspirate, skin biopsies or swabs samples suggesting that a simple smears sample run by PCR instead more invasive samples is enough to obtain a positive diagnosis of CL. Leishmania, affecting mammals. More than 30 Leishmania species are recognized, of which 20 are considered infective for humans and other mammals Results:“Study characteristics” usually connotes study design. Instead authors list PCR methods and source of biological material. Consider reorganizing.“Quality assessment of study reports” logically comes before the main results (and so perhaps should the associated figures). Consider reorganizing Diagnostic accuracy of molecular tests and analysis of heterogeneity: consider adopting a more narrative style rather than just pointing out tables and figures.Table 2, as presented, is very confusing. If it represents subgroup analyses, then one would intuitively think that the subgroups would be consecutively recruited vs Case-control , and not the combined categories.Figure 1. Consider detailing the “inappropriate gold standard”s since 15 studies were excluded because of this criterion.Why is PRISMA flow chart also included as supplementary material?Discussion:Generally poorly organized.Page 10, 283-290: these are results.Page 10, 289-290: is this analysis post-hoc? it is not mentioned in the methodsNo conclusionOther stylistic issues:Abstract:Background: “….PubMed, EMBASE and LILACS”: this should be part of the MethodologyMethodology/Principal findings: Suggest excluding "This is to be expected, because the controls in case-control studies are often healthy persons, whereas controls in consecutive studies are in fact suspected patients."The following sentence is grammatically incorrect: “Estimates were lower on aspirates, skin biopsies and swab samples in general population 0.90  and 0.87  for sensitivity and specificity, respectively.” “More than 30 Leishmania species are recognized, of which 20 are considered infective for humans and other mammals.” This sentence should be referenced.Other examples of grammatical errors or stylistic concerns include but not limited to:“ significant differences between the readout method of the index test, however, subgroups were analyzed separately: “all readout methods of the index test except LAMP and real-time PCR” and “all readout methods of the index test without exception”.“The lack of standardization is another limitation when you want to compare diagnostic accuracy studies for molecular tools.”Page 3, 70-71Page 4, 95Page 7, 196-198Page 9, 264-265--------------------what does this mean?). 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If the only modifications needed are minor and/or editorial, you may wish to recommend “Minor Revision” or “Accept”.Reviewer #2: (No Response)Reviewer #3: (No Response)**********Summary and General CommentsUse this section to provide overall comments, discuss strengths/weaknesses of the study, novelty, significance, general execution and scholarship. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. If requesting major revision, please articulate the new experiments that are needed.Reviewer #2: (No Response)Reviewer #3: Authors have carefully revised the manuscript. Major comments have been addressed and the paper now is more organized than the original version.The conclusion should follow limitations section.English still needs substantial work.eg, lines 324, 327, 350...**********what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article  in patients with clinical or epidemiological suspicion of CL: systematic review and meta-analysis.," has been formally accepted for publication in PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases.We have now passed your article onto the PLOS Production Department who will complete the rest of the publication process. All authors will receive a confirmation email upon publication.The corresponding author will soon be receiving a typeset proof for review, to ensure errors have not been introduced during production. Please review the PDF proof of your manuscript carefully, as this is the last chance to correct any scientific or type-setting errors. Please note that major changes, or those which affect the scientific understanding of the work, will likely cause delays to the publication date of your manuscript. 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PLOS Genetics are issuing this expression of concern to alert readers to questions about the validity of some statements in the article authored by Carles Vilariño-Güell and colleagues [The editors of lleagues .Shortly after the article was published, readers contacted the journal with concerns regarding the soundness of the research described and the rigor of the editorial process. Internal investigation of the review and editorial process of the manuscript revealed no evidence of scientific misconduct or conflict of interest. However, it was noted by the editors involved in the investigation that there were important discrepancies between the actual results and the claims that were made in parts of the manuscript. Because those discrepancies had the potential to introduce errors in clinical genetic test interpretation and cause harm, the journal contacted the authors to request that they consider issuing corrections to two sentences in the Abstract, two sentences in the Author summary, and one sentence in the Discussion.Responding on behalf of the authors, Carles Vilariño-Güell, the corresponding author, did not agree to the requested corrections. In the editors’ opinion these corrections were required to prevent potential harm. The authors and their institution have been made aware of this Expression of Concern and the journal has initiated a more extensive examination of the review and editorial process. The outcome of these inquiries will determine whether further action is required. The editors involved in issuing this Expression of Concern have also authored an Editorial  providin


Impact Factor (IF) of academic journals continues to gain further importance with not only science community but also academic institutions, funding agencies as well as the Editors of academic journals the world over with every passing day. Despite lot of criticism IF has attracted over the last decade in particular and lot of drawbacks, it is still considered as the best available Scientometrics to judge the standard of an academic journal.It may be mentioned here that Impact Factor is a citation based metrics based on the average number of times an article published in a particular journal has been cited by authors in other journals.ISI has about 34,171 journals published in academic disciplines which includes 12,271 journals covering medical and social sciences.4Faced with this new situation the Editors and Publishers have started using different strategies to increase their Impact Factor i.e by refusing to publish supplements, encouraging authors and reviewers to cite papers published in their journals. Ensure early publication of papers which are likely to be cited early in the year and making the papers electronically accessible through their websites as early as possible.8San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA) issued in December 2012 during the American Society of Biology meeting was considered almost a fatal blow to Impact Factor. DORA emphasized to stop the use of “Journal Impact Factor” in judging the scientists’ work.13The increasing importance of Impact Factor is evident from the fact that many publishers and Editors who fail to get indexed by Web of Sciences feel proud to decorate the title of their journals with various fake Impact Factors. Some of these commonly known fake IF include the following:The twelve academic journals from Pakistan which includes three medical journals which enjoy Impact Factor are shown in Table-IIWhile the editors should concentrate on improving the quality of the manuscripts they accept for publication and accelerate their efforts to improve the standard of the journal, manipulating and artificially boosting their Impact Factor is highly unethical. They should follow author friendly policy, help and guide them to improve their manuscripts with the help of members of the editorial board and peer reviewers. It is nice for the editors to know their rights but they must also remember their duties and responsibilities which include teaching and training through workshops. Many journal editors and bodies of Editors including World Association of Medical Editors (WAME), Eastern Mediterranean Association of Medical Editors (EMAME), Asia-Pacific Association of Medical Editors (APAME), Pakistan Association of Medical Editors (PAME) and editor’s bodies in many other countries are already doing this by organizing workshops and these efforts should not only be continued but also accelerated in collaboration with other professional specialty organizations and medical institutions.


Open access (OA) publishing rates have risen dramatically in the biomedical sciences in the past decade. However, few studies have focused on the publishing activities and attitudes of early career researchers. The aim of this study was to examine current publishing activities of clinical and research fellows and their perceptions of OA publishing and public access.This study employed a mixed methods approach. Data on publications authored by Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center fellows between 2013 and 2018 were collected via an in-house author profile system and citation indexes. Journals were categorized according to SHERPA/RoMEO classifications. In-person and telephone interviews were conducted with fifteen fellows to discern their perceptions of OA publishing.The total percentage of fellows’ publications that were freely available OA was 28.6%, with a relatively flat rate between 2013 and 2018. Publications with fellows as first authors were significantly more likely to be OA. Fellows cited high article processing charges (APCs) and perceived lack of journal quality or prestige as barriers to OA publishing. Fellows generally expressed support for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) public access policy.While the fellows in this study acknowledged the potential of OA to aid in research dissemination, they also expressed hesitation to publish OA related to confusion surrounding legitimate OA and predatory publications and frustration with APCs. Fellows supported the NIH public access policy and accepted it as part of their research process. Health sciences information professionals could potentially leverage this acceptance of public access to advocate for OA publishing. Open access (OA) and public access publishing represent growing and ever-changing areas of interest to health sciences information professionals. The recent ten-year anniversary of the National Institute of Health’s public access policy and the approaching ten-year anniversary of the launch of the National Library of Medicine’s full-text archive PubMed Central (PMC) provide an opportunity to reflect on the growth of public access over the past decade. The emergence of Plan S, an initiative by cOALition S, has stirred debate about the future of OA among publishers, academics, researchers, and information professionals.While many health sciences information professionals have been at the forefront of open publishing initiatives, the vitality of the OA movement ultimately hinges on the decisions made by authors about where they publish their work. This is particularly applicable in regard to the research and publishing activities of early career professionals , many of whom are still in the nascent stage of their publishing careers. As early career professionals in the health sciences establish their research careers, it is essential to develop a baseline understanding of how this group perceives the challenges and benefits of various publishing models, not only to understand how these attitudes may shift over time, but also to understand how we as health information professionals can support this group in the immediate future.Previous studies have sought to examine authors’ perceptions of OA, though most have focused on faculty and none have exclusively examined the experiences and perceptions of early career researchers. Study results have varied with some authors finding age, seniority, and rank of faculty authors were not strong predictors of authors’ perceptions of OA , while oFindings regarding barriers to publishing OA have been more consistent across the literature. Dallmeier-Tiessen et al. analyzed responses from 38,358 authors across multiple disciplines and found that the most common barriers to OA publishing were funding and perceived lack of quality . RespondPrevious studies have also attempted to determine authors’ perceptions of public access, particularly in regard to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) public access policy , 12. ComJust how much OA publishing is taking place in the sciences has been the subject of many scientific studies. A 2012 study found that that only 6,713 of 340,000 OA scientific articles published in 2011 were immediately OA . BiomediEarly career researchers such as clinical and research fellows are a population in transition, existing at the foundation of their professional careers. This group traditionally conducts and publishes research, but they are still forming their research and publishing praxis and, as such, may provide valuable insight into how publishing habits change over time. The aim of this study was to develop a more nuanced understanding of the publishing activities of early career researchers in the health sciences. Additionally, the study aimed to understand factors that influence fellows’ publication targets, perceived advantages and disadvantages of OA publishing, perceived barriers and abetments to OA publishing, and views of the NIH public access policy.A list of all current Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK) clinical and research fellows (n=296) was supplied by the MSK Human Resources Department to the authors in August 2018. This list included fellows’ names, departments, hire dates, and previous institutions. In November 2018, this study was determined to meet the regulatory exemption for institutional review board (IRB) review by the MSK Human Research Protection Program under 45 CFR 46.101(b).A database was created in Microsoft Excel to track all publication data, which was later imported to Stata. Publication data for all fellows was first searched using the MSK Library’s in-house author and publication database, Synapse, which contains references for journal articles, books and chapters, conference papers, meeting abstracts, and other items published by authors at MSK. Currently, Synapse includes content from 1994 to present. Synapse is updated monthly using five bibliographic databases: Scopus, Web of Science, BIOSIS Citation Index, CINAHL, and PsycINFO. A team of three information professionals reviews, vets, and uploads citations to Synapse to ensure accuracy and comprehensiveness.For fellows without Synapse profiles, an author name search was conducted in Scopus and Web of Science. Authors were then matched with their names and previous institutions. If an ORCID identification (ID) was listed in the author’s Scopus profile, the author’s ORCID ID was checked to determine if the author’s current employer was MSK. To ensure accuracy and reduce name ambiguity, fellows were asked via email to confirm (1) if the author profiles found in Scopus and Web of Science that matched their name and previous institution accurately represented their publication record and (2) if all of their publications were accounted for.Publication types included in this study were published, scholarly, peer-reviewed journal articles. Conference proceedings , editorials, and book chapters were excluded. The publication years included were 2013 to 2018. Publication information that was captured at the article level included journal names, publication titles, authors, and publication dates. The most recent impact factor for the journal was also captured. Where available, the five-year impact factor was recorded. If the five-year impact factor was not available, the two-year or current year journal impact factor was recorded. Impact factors were located using Journal Citation Reports and Web of Science. Specific authorship information at the article level included if fellows were listed as first author on the publication and if fellows listed MSK or another institution as their affiliation at the time of publication.All articles were identified by publication model based on the journal they were published in. For the purposes of this study, journals were grouped according to the SHERPA/RoMEO categories. SHERPA/RoMEO is a service provided by the Securing a Hybrid Environment for Research Preservation and Access (SHERPA) organization, which categorizes the copyright and self-archiving policies of journals by color. The SHERPA/RoMEO color categories are :Blue: Author can archive post-print  or publisher’s version/portable document format (PDF)Green: Author can archive pre-print and post-print or publisher’s version/PDFYellow: Author can archive pre-print White: Archiving is not formally supportedUngraded/Unavailable: The publisher’s policies have not been checked by SHERPA/RoMEO or the publication was not found in SHERPA/RoMEOPublication model information for journals was manually identified by consulting the websites of all journals and by checking this information against the SHERPA/RoMEO database.The ability to access all publications  was then determined. The goal of this step was to determine the current “openness” of a publication. For example, some publications that were published in green journals, which have several options for making a publication “open” (including archiving pre-prints and post-prints and a paid OA option), might still not be available OA. Quality control measures were taken to ensure that publications were legally freely available, rather than available via research sharing platforms such as ResearchGate. First, publications were checked using Unpaywall, a service that harvests “content from legal sources including repositories run by universities, governments, and scholarly societies, as well as open content hosted by publishers themselves” . UnpaywaLastly, publications were evaluated to determine if they fell under the auspices of the NIH public access policy. Publications were checked in PMC for an NIH Manuscript Submission (NIHMS) system number or a PMCID number and were checked in eRA Commons and NIH RePORTER. The goal of this final step was to determine what percentage of publications had been made openly available due to required compliance with the NIH public access policy and what percentage had been made available OA that did not fall under this funding mandate.Semi-structured interviews were conducted with fifteen fellows either in person or via telephone between December 2018 and January 2019. Fellows were recruited for interviews via email. Interviews lasted between thirty and forty-five minutes. Incentives were not offered for participation in the interviews. All interviews were recorded, transcribed, and open coded according to emergent themes. Fellows were asked questions regarding factors influencing their publication targets, their perceptions of OA publishing in their specific disciplines, their perceptions of advantages and disadvantages of OA publishing, and factors that have encouraged or inhibited their decisions to pursue OA publishing or their decisions to do so in the future. The Follow-up interviews were conducted in July 2019 to enumerate perceptions of public access among the fellows. Twelve of the original fifteen interviewees participated in the follow-up interviews. All twelve of these interviewees had an article that was freely available OA.Of the 296 clinical and research fellows at MSK, 57 were determined to have had no scholarly, peer-reviewed journal articles published between 2013 and 2018 and were, thus, excluded from the study. The publication information for an additional 21 fellows could not be verified. After these exclusions, the total number of fellows included was 218. The range of total publications for fellows was 1–45. The average number of publications was 6.8. The total number of publications for all fellows was 1,489.The fellows in this study represented 12 clinical and research specialties . ClinicaThe journal publication model with the most publications represented was green, followed by yellow, ungraded/unavailable, white, and blue .On average, fellows had published 3.8 publications in green journals. New England Journal of Medicine. Publications included in the analysis appeared in a total of 676 journals. Some  of the journals either did not have an impact factor or the impact factor could not be determined. The impact factors for the remaining journals (n=575) ranged from 0.349 to 79.258. The journal with the highest impact factor was the The total percentage of publications that were freely available OA was 28.3% (n=422). The average number of publications per fellow that were freely available OA was 1.9. These data were positively skewed, with 75% of fellows having 3 or fewer publications available OA.MSK publications (publications where the author or fellow listed MSK as their affiliation) made up 16.2% (n=241) of the total number of publications. The average number of MSK publications that fellows had authored was 1.1. The range of MSK publications for fellows was 0–44.The vast majority of the 422 publications that were freely available  fell under the NIH public access policy, representing 21.2% of all publications in this study. Publications that were freely available without falling under the NIH public access policy accounted for only 7.1% (n=106) of all publications in the study.2(1)=7.2284, p=0.007).A chi-square analysis was performed to determine if there was a statistically significant relationship between high output authors and publication openness. “High output” authors were defined as authors with a number of publications in the 90th percentile, which in this case was 17 publications written by 24 authors. We found that high output authors were less likely than non-high output authors to publish OA (χ2(1)=10.9705, p=0.001).We were also interested in determining whether first authorship impacted the availability of publications in terms of OA. Publications on which the fellow was listed as first author accounted for 38.1% of all publications (n=568). We found that publications on which fellows were first author were significantly more likely to be available OA than not available OA . We were curious to determine whether MSK publications were any more likely to be available OA than non-MSK publications. We found that MSK publications were not significantly more likely to be available OA than publications published at other institutions (χ2(1)=2.1093, p=0.146).Furthermore, we examined the relationship between MSK publications and current publication availability. The MSK Library supports several institutional memberships with OA publishers to offset the cost of APCs, including SpringerOpen and Fifteen fellows representing 7 MSK clinical fellowships were interviewed for this study. The breakdown of authors by department or discipline was: medicine (n=4), surgery (n=4), urology (n=2), pediatrics (n=2), pathology (n=1), psychiatry (n=1), and radiology (n=1). The total number of publications for all interviewed authors was 150, and the average number of publications per author was 10. Of the 15 authors, 11 had a publication that was freely available OA. The average number of OA publications available per interviewed author was 2.Authors were asked to define “open access” in their own words. Thirteen out of fifteen authors gave adequate descriptions of OA. One author gave an inadequate description, and one author could not provide a definition of OA. The interviewer provided these authors with a definition of OA, from the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC), as “the free, immediate, online availability of research articles coupled with the rights to use these articles fully in the digital environment” . All fifTwelve of the fifteen authors were asked to define “public access.” Two authors equated “public access” with “open access.” Eight referred to the NIH public access policy, and one asked the interviewer if public access funding was associated with “National Cancer Institute Funding” and, upon further questioning, referred to the NIH public access policy. One author was unable to offer a definition. The NIH public access policy was defined for interviewees as the “policy that ensures that the public has access to the published results of NIH-funded research,” which “requires scientists to submit final peer-reviewed journal manuscripts that arise from NIH funds to the digital archive PubMed Central” .Authors were asked to describe factors influencing their publication targets. The most frequent factor given for selecting a journal to publish in related to journal readership and was described as “target audience” or “relevance to readers.” Authors noted that they aimed to publish in the journals that were most frequently read in their own disciplines.Impact factor was also listed as a factor for selecting a journal, with some authors listing specific impact factor values that they would not consider publishing below. One author specifically stated that he would “try to avoid” publishing in a journal with an impact factor below 3.0.Perceived likelihood of acceptance also influenced journal selection. Authors stated that they were more likely to publish in a journal that they or their coauthors had already published in. Perceived time to publication and duration of the peer-review process were also stated as factors influencing their selections. Authors were more likely to publish in journals that had shorter submission-to-publication windows.Authors stated that their mentors or the principal investigators of the studies often influenced their target publications, particularly if they were not the first author on the publications. Authors stated that they felt they would be more likely to publish OA if they were first author, consistent with the results of our publication analysis.Eleven of the fifteen authors stated that they perceived OA publications as being “of lower quality,” “less prestigious,” and “less credible” than publications that were not OA in their specific disciplines. Authors stated that publications that were fully OA tended to have “lower impact factors.”Authors questioned whether OA publishing was advantageous in terms of research dissemination due to alternative dissemination channels, citing networking sites like ResearchGate or social media platforms such as Twitter as examples. Authors were unclear of the advantage of initially publishing in an OA publication when funding mandates such as the NIH’s public access policy dictate that authors make their research freely available through PMC twelve months after publication.Authors distinguished between perceptions of OA in basic science research and clinical research. One author described OA as being viewed “very positively” in basic science disciplines and stated that “pre-print servers like arXiv are rising in popularity with basic science researchers.” Some authors stated that they believed perceptions of various publishing models were more institution-specific than discipline-specific.Of the twelve participants who participated in follow-up interviews, ten expressed familiarity with the NIH public access policy. Nine fellows had published articles that were supported by NIH funding, and their associated publications were subsequently deposited in PMC. Of these nine fellows, seven had used submission method C . Two had used submission method B . No interviewees used submission method A .Of the nine interviewees who had NIH public access policy publications, all expressed support for the policy. The top reasons for supporting the policy were enhanced research dissemination and a desire to make research more discoverable and equitable. Several authors noted that the policy had been in place throughout their research careers and was essentially “second nature.” One author explained:I’ve been actively doing research for five years and most of it is NIH funded, so I’m just used to having to adhere to the policy and the paperwork that’s involved. It’s just part of the research process for me.Two interviewees described challenges with NIH public access policy compliance, including the time-consuming nature of the documentation required but described the policy as “positive overall” and “still important,” respectively.Authors listed increased readership as an advantage to publishing OA, stating that OA could aid in “advancing your research agenda” and “research dissemination.” Authors also mentioned the possibility of “increased citation counts” as an advantage. The potential for increased collaboration between institutions was another advantage, with one author stating that “open access can help you more quickly identify people doing similar work.” Finally, authors stated that the “egalitarian” nature of OA was beneficial for both author and reader.Perceived disadvantages of OA publications included perceived lack of research quality and poor reputations of OA publications among research peers and mentors. Authors also stated that the relative newness of some OA journals was a disadvantage because newer journals tended not to be well established in terms of readership or reputation and tended to have lower impact factors.When asked to identify potential barriers to OA publishing, thirteen of fifteen authors listed APCs. One author stated that he would never pay an APC “on principle.” Other authors expressed willingness to pay an APC but stated that the APCs were simply “too high.” One author summarized this sentiment:I’d like to publish more in open access journals, but some of the fees for authors are like $3000, $4000. I’m on a trainee salary, living in one of the most expensive cities in the country, I’ve got two kids. How could I ever afford that fee? It makes it untenable. I mean, with my research, I want to be “open,” but with the fees they charge, how can I?Another author described why she avoided paying author processing charges journals with a paid OA option:I think all my publications so far have been in a journal where there’s some sort of “author’s choice” where you can pay to have your article be open access, but then you see the cost and the idea that it’s a real “choice” is laughable.Authors also identified negative associations with OA publishing models as a barrier and noted confusion surrounding predatory publishers and OA publishers. One author stated:It [OA publishing] really has a negative connotation. In 50% of cases, this connotation is probably inaccurate. We younger researchers are very aware of predatory journals and somewhere along the line these got linked with open access journals.Another author further elucidated this point:It’s confusing in terms of which journals are “legitimate” open access and which are “predatory,” if they both require fees.When asked to identify potential abetments or factors that would further encourage OA publishing, authors listed research funding specifically earmarked for offsetting the cost of APCs. Authors also stated that having more established scientific scholars publish their work OA might encourage early career researchers and trainees to follow suit. One author stated:There’s a growing movement and the more that prominent scientists publish in them, maybe more and more people will want to publish in them. It’s a virtuous cycle, especially for people of my generation.Lastly, authors expressed confusion regarding OA model labels, specifically “color” models as presented in SHERPA/RoMEO, and the role of self-archiving in pre-print and post-print repositories in OA.Many of the perceived barriers and challenges to publishing OA were consistent with those described in previous studies. For instance, Dallmeier-Tiessen et al.’s study found the 2 most commonly cited barriers to OA publishing were funding (39% of respondents) and perceived lack of quality (30% of respondents) , which wThe fact that there was a significant relationship between first authorship and publication openness might indicate that early career researchers, if given agency, were more likely to publish OA. However, while 86.0%  of publications in this study were published in blue, yellow, or green journals, only 28.6% of all publications were freely available OA. It was also worth noting that over the course of 5 years, OA rates did not keep pace with publication rates. The fellows in this study published more as they progressed in their careers, but the rate of OA publications remained relatively flat, which might indicate that many authors were not taking advantage of the paid OA option in “hybrid” journals.American Journal of Transplantation (a Wiley title) rose from $4,200 to $4,300 USD. APCs that continue to rise in price may create equity issues in scientific scholarly publishing, serving to further widen the gap between the “haves” and “have nots,” in terms of research funding.Shamash noted that the “average APC continues to rise by £100 a year since 2014” . As an eHigh APCs can be particularly problematic for early career researchers and trainees who lack the requisite funding to pay for APCs. Björk’s 2017 study highlighted the staggering transformation of subscription journals to “hybrid OA” journals, from around 2,000 in 2009 to almost 10,000 in 2016 (a 400% increase) [Continued education on the part of information professionals may help to offset misconceptions about OA, but ultimately a paradigm shift in the scholarly communications infrastructure may be necessary to help early career professionals in the health sciences not only understand the benefits of OA, but also have the ability to take advantage of OA publishing to its fullest extent. OA advocacy by information professionals can only go so far without the full institutional support of research leaders, administrators, and faculty.Effective advocacy also requires dismantling pre-existing power structures that promote inequity in the scholarly publishing sphere, which includes high APCs. For years, information professionals have worked to offset the cost of APCs for researchers through OA funding, and many researchers have “built” the cost of APCs into funding. Yet perhaps the time has come for information professionals to present authors with research that illustrates the rapid growth of hybrid APCs and the overall lack of hybrid APC pricing transparency among publishers. In 2016, the Norwegian Research Council and German Research Foundation opted to pay OA fees for researchers but prohibited them from being spent on articles in hybrid journals . ResearcIn addition to “growing up” with the public access funding mandates, early career researchers have effectively grown up with predatory publishing. The rise of predatory publishing has only served to exacerbate concerns about the quality of OA publications and has resulted in a general state of wariness and distrust of OA. The fellows have spent their early research years struggling to differentiate legitimate OA publications from predatory publications, leading to confusion surrounding not just what OA is, but why it matters. For many early career researchers, the motivation to publish their research OA is simply not there, especially when so much of their research falls under the domain of public access.Dawson offers several practical suggestions for effective strategies for OA outreach, such as eliminating OA jargon and collaborating with research units in our institutions . She alsMost of my research is supported by NIH, so it ends up being “open” no matter what I do. I don’t really care how it happens. It feels good that tax payers get access to research they funded, I approve of that. But I feel no strong desire to make my work that is not affiliated with NIH funding open, especially if it means I have to pay a fee.Fellows expressed support for the NIH public access policy. Health sciences information professionals could potentially leverage the fact that, today, early career professionals have essentially grown up with a policy that effectively mandates “openness.” These fellows seemed to understand the benefits of public access but were less certain of the benefits of OA. Health sciences information professionals can draw helpful parallels between OA and public access for researchers.It is equally as important for information professionals to understand the perspective of early career researchers and trainees when it comes to their motivations for selecting their publication targets and specific publishing models. In the sciences and medicine, factors such as research impact metrics and journal prestige or ranking remain paramount for authors. Information professionals must strive to understand how the historical power dynamics in the field of scientific publishing function and how these systems can create structural inequalities for early career researchers, as well as traditionally marginalized groups. Only by truly understanding the challenges that early career researchers face, as well as their motivations, can we begin to shift the tide toward more open and accessible research outputs.AppendixClick here for additional data file.Robin O’Hanlon, ohanlonr@mskcc.org, http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0869-4118, Associate Librarian, User Services, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center Library, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York, NYJeanine McSweeney, mcsweenj@mskcc.org, Associate Librarian, Scholarly Communications, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center Library, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York, NYSamuel Stabler, ss5346@hunter.cuny.edu, Hunter College, City University of New York (CUNY), New York, NY


In this section of the symposium, I will talk about manuscript preparation for maximizing the likelihood that your work will be sent for review. I will talk about common author errors that usually guarantee an immediate reject decision such as not reading and following the Instructions to Authors. I will emphasize the importance of plain, good writing. Editors of high impact journals receive 10 or more new manuscripts per week, and due to limited page space, have to reject 80-90% of them. Regardless of scholarly quality, if the point and contribution are not clear in a quick scan of the paper, it likely will not be reviewed favorably. I will provide tips for strong scientific writing that are commonly violated in manuscript submissions, and provide references for additional writing support.