Preprints in Medicine: Useful or Harmful?

Bonnechère, Bruno

doi:10.3389/fmed.2020.579100

Cited by 15 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…Of note, PSTP directors also emphasized the importance of a first-author publication per se and were less concerned about having a first-author publication in a high-impact journal. Posting a manuscript on a preprint server, such as BioRχiv or MedRχiv, that can be cited by the applicant could help fulfill this important benchmark ( 11 ) and provide PSTP directors with tangible evidence of research productivity in the absence of a published paper. The challenge of when and where to publish is faced by every researcher.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pearls of wisdom for aspiring physician-scientist residency applicants and program directors

et al. 2022

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pearls of wisdom for aspiring physician-scientist residency applicants and program directors

et al. 2022

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“…An emerging issue that has not yet been addressed is the publication of medical photographs in preprints. Preprints, as “complete and public drafts of scientific documents, not yet certified by peer review” [ 48 ], do not pass the same scrutiny as regular journal publications, but their number and importance have enormously increased [ 49 , 50 ]. The latest update of the ICMJE Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals [ 5 ] in 2021 emphasized the need for appropriate declarations regarding published articles in preprint archives, such as disclosure of funding sources and disclosure of interest, but ethical issues about consent for patients’ photographs were not mentioned.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Publishing Identifiable Patient Photographs in Scientific Journals: Scoping Review of Policies and Practices

et al. 2022

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Background Publishing identifiable patient data in scientific journals may jeopardize patient privacy and confidentiality if best ethical practices are not followed. Current journal practices show considerable diversity in the publication of identifiable patient photographs, and different stakeholders may have different opinions of and practices in publishing patient photographs. Objective This scoping review aimed to identify existing evidence and map knowledge gaps in medical research on the policies and practices of publishing identifiable photographs in scientific articles. Methods We performed a comprehensive search of the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, CINAHL with Full Text, Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects, Ovid MEDLINE, and Scopus. The Open Science Framework, PROSPERO, BASE, Google Scholar, OpenGrey, ClinicalTrials.gov, the Campbell Collaboration Library, and Science.gov were also searched. Results After screening the initial 15,949 titles and abstracts, 98 (0.61%) publications were assessed for eligibility at the full-text level, and 30 (0.19%) publications were included in this review. The studies were published between 1994 and 2020; most had a cross-sectional design and were published in journals covering different medical disciplines. We identified 3 main topics. The first included ethical aspects of the use of facial photographs in publications. In different clinical settings, the consent process was not conducted properly, and health professionals did not recognize the importance of obtaining written patient consent for taking and using patient medical photographs. They often considered verbal consent sufficient or even used the photographs without consent. The second topic included studies that investigated the practices and use of medical photography in publishing. Both patients and doctors asked for confidential storage and maintenance of medical photographs. Patients preferred to be photographed by their physicians using an institutional camera and preferred nonidentifiable medical photographs not only for publication but also in general. Conventional methods of deidentification of facial photographs concealing the eye area were recognized as unsuccessful in protecting patient privacy. The third topic emerged from studies investigating medical photography in journal articles. These studies showed great diversity in publishing practices regarding consent for publication of medical photographs. Journal policies regarding the consent process and consent forms were insufficient, and existing ethical professional guidelines were not fully implemented in actual practices. Patients’ photographs from open-access medical journals were found on public web-based platforms. Conclusions This scoping review showed a diversity of practices in publishing identifiable patient photographs and an unsatisfactory level of knowledge of this issue among different stakeholders despite existing standards. Emerging issues include the availability of patients’ photographs from open-access journals or preprints in the digital environment. There is a need to improve standards and processes to obtain proper consent to fully protect the privacy of patients in published articles.

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“… 45 Bonnechère recommends that, to avoid possible harm, a preprint be removed after the final paper is published in a peer-reviewed journal. 46 However, this is not advisable since a preprint represents a historical document that provides open and public evidence of the historical evolution of the paper, as well as a bibliometric record, and thus should never be removed. Ultimately, the integrity and credibility of preprints can be fortified only when they are treated as ‘ethical equals’ with peer-reviewed literature, for both COVID-19 literature 47 and other fields of study.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Adjusting the use of preprints to accommodate the ‘quality’ factor in response to COVID-19

Silva¹

2021

Journal of Taibah University Medical Sciences

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Preprints are typically crude precursors of peer-reviewed papers that are placed almost immediately, save for some superficial screening, on an open-access repository to allow the information to reach readers quickly, circumventing the long-drawn process typically associated with processing in peer-reviewed journals. For early-career researchers who might be enthusiastic about obtaining some recognition for their efforts, or wanting open and public input about their work, preprints are certainly a useful publication choice. However, if health-related data and information have not been carefully scrutinised, they may pose a risk and may even serve as a source of public health misinformation. Surging growth and competition among preprint servers, coupled with a massive volume of COVID-19-related preprints, mainly on bioRxiv and medRxiv , as well as select indexing now being tested on PubMed, suggests that preprints are being increasingly used in the biomedical sciences. Stronger and more robust ethical policies are needed to screen preprints before they are released to the public, and even if this implies a slight delay in publication, it may increase academics' trust in this form of scientific information and communication. Clear and stringent ethical policies need to be urgently introduced by ethics groups such as COPE and the ICMJE, whose many member journals allow preprints to be posted before traditional peer review. Stringent ethical guidelines that treat misconduct equally in preprints and peer-reviewed papers will boost the integrity of academic publishing.

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Preprints in Medicine: Useful or Harmful?

Cited by 15 publications

References 28 publications

Pearls of wisdom for aspiring physician-scientist residency applicants and program directors

Pearls of wisdom for aspiring physician-scientist residency applicants and program directors

Publishing Identifiable Patient Photographs in Scientific Journals: Scoping Review of Policies and Practices

Adjusting the use of preprints to accommodate the ‘quality’ factor in response to COVID-19

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