Facilitators and Barriers for Young Medical Doctors Writing Their First Manuscript for Publication

Abstract

Although scientific publication is often mandatory in medical professions, writing the first research article for publication is challenging, especially as medical curricula have only a minor focus on scientific writing. The aim was therefore to identify facilitators and barriers experienced by medical doctors writing their first scientific article for publication. An explorative inductive approach made use of semi-structured interviews for collecting data until saturation. Data were analyzed with systematic text condensation. Several barriers were identified: (a) writing in general; (b) writing in English; (c) dealing with content, structure, and presentation; and (d) navigating in the author group. Good supervision in the initial writing phase was a facilitating factor. Medical doctors requested a course in which they could work on their own articles and give feedback to fellow students. They valued skilled lecturers and individual supervision, and they wanted to learn about author instructions, how to present text correctly, and how to sell their core message. Their goal was to create a useful end product and to obtain European Credit Transfer System (ECTS) points. The facilitators and barriers that medical doctors experience when writing their first scientific article for publication and their course requests should be reflected in the learning objectives and content of future courses.

Development of a Scientific Writing Course to Increase Fellow Scholarship

“…Academic training programs frequently encourage trainees to participate in research and publish their results in peer-reviewed medical journals. However, lack of prior writing experience, poor organization of thought, absence of a writing culture or mentorship, and language or cultural differences can hamper writing and publication success ( 1 , 2 ). The implications of this are potentially far-reaching because trainees often go on to become mentors to future trainees, and academic promotion and leadership opportunities are often tied to publication success ( 3 ).…”

From Targeted Needs Assessment to Course Ready for Implementation—A Model for Curriculum Development and the Course Results

“…We approached the course development stepwise, inspired by Kern [1] and previously published the first two steps [6,7]. Step 3 of Kern's model is about setting goals and objectives for the curriculum.…”

“…This led us to assess the needs of the targeted learners, i.e. medical doctors writing their first scientific manuscript for publication, thus related to Kern's step 2 [7].…”

“…Thereby, we expected to come as close as possible to an understanding of the immediate needs of the targeted learners. The purposes of the in-depth interviews were to investigate (a) how PhD students with a medical background experienced writing their first scientific article and (b) their views on whether a tailor-made course could help them overcome possible barriers [7].…”

“…All participants were targeted learners for the curriculum under development. The recruitment of participants for the in-depth interviews was described elsewhere [7]. We used purposeful sampling to select the participants, which meant that they were included if they (a) were trained medical doctors, (b) had experience with writing their first scientific article, and (c) were active in research education as PhD students or enrolled in a specific curriculum as research students with plans to become PhD students within the following year.…”