Publication delay in pharmacy practice journals: a comparative analysis
Palavras-chave:
Journalology, Publication process, Publication delay, Pharmacy practiceResumo
Introduction: Articles published in scientific journals are a valuable source of information and the main system to communicate research results. Authors frequently complain about the long duration of the editorial process, which includes time of external peer-review, layout formatting, and metadata indexing. Differences in the duration of these processes between areas have not been sufficiently explored.
Aim: To evaluate the duration of the publication process in pharmacy practice journals compared with other scientific disciplines.
Methods: From 67 pharmacy practice journals previously identified, 33 indexed in PubMed were selected for data collection. Metadata of all articles published between 2009-2018 were extracted from PubMed. To create a comparison group of randomly selected articles, the first PMIDs of each year between 2009-2018 were identified. Four lag times for the different steps of the publication and indexing process were calculated: Total publication lag (days between ‘submission date’ and ‘online publication date’), acceptance lag (days between ‘submission date’ and ‘acceptance date’), lead lag (days between ‘acceptance date’ and ‘online publication date’), and indexing lag (days between ‘online publication date’ and ‘Entry date’). Impact Factor (IF) and CiteScore data were also collected. Statistical analyzes were performed in SPSS v20 and RStudio v1.2.
Results: The 33 pharmacy practice journals published a total of 26,256 articles. CiteScore of 25 journals was calculated with mean of 1.34 (SD 0.90); only 8 journals have IF (mean 2.135; SD 0.681). In the comparison group, 5,622 different journals published 23,888 articles with a median of 2 articles per journal (IQR 1-5). CiteScore was calculated for 4,879 of these journals, with mean of 2.61 (SD 2.64); 3,853 journals have IF (mean 3.337; SD 0.811). Comparison journals presented higher report rates for all the editorial process dates than pharmacy practice journals: submission OR=0.9 (IC95% 0.76-0.82), acceptance OR=0.86 (0.83-089), and Online publication OR=0.001 (0.0006-0.002). Acceptance lag was not different between pharmacy practice and comparison group (93 vs. 97 days), while small differences existed in lead lag (15 vs. 25 days; Cohen`s d=0.279). However, a greater difference was found in indexing lag (12 vs. 4 days; Cohen`s d=0.703). The analyses of pharmacy practice journals showed important variability in acceptance lag (range 13 to 290 days). Open access pharmacy practice journals presented a lower acceptance lag than subscription ones (74 vs. 126 days). Acceptance lag showed no association with CiteScore in both group of journals (p>0,05). The IF presented a significant inverse association, but with no effect size, with the acceptance lag, in both groups (p<0.001).
Discussion: Although the average acceptance lag of pharmacy practice journals was similar to a generic comparison group, huge variability exists between these journals. While authors may consider the smaller acceptance lag as a good characteristic, literature suggests risks associated to fraudulent peer-review.
Conclusions: About 95 days since submission are required to have an article accepted, whether in pharmacy practice or in comparison groups of biomedical journals.
Referências
Sperr E V. Libraries and the future of scholarly communication. Mol Cancer. 2006 Nov 7;5:58.
Ng KH. Exploring new frontiers of electronic publishing in biomedical science. Singapore Med J. 2009 Mar;50(3):230-4.
Salthammer T. Quality or quantity? Historic and current trends in scientific publishing. Indoor Air. 2016 Jun;26(3):347-9.
Glasziou P, Aronson J. A brief history of clinical evidence updates and bibliographic databases. J R Soc Med. 2018 Aug;111(8):292-301.
Shojania KG, Sampson M, Ansari MT, Ji J, Doucette S, Moher D. How quickly do systematic reviews go out of date? A survival analysis. Ann Intern Med. 2007 Aug 21;147(4):224-33.
Huisman J, Smits J. Duration and quality of the peer review process: the author’s perspective. Scientometrics. 2017;113(1):633-650.
Igi R. Conflicting interests involved in the process of publishing in biomedical journals. J BUON. 2015 Sep-Oct;20(5):1373-7.
Wijesinha-Bettoni R, Shankar K, Marusic A, Grimaldo F, Seeber M, Edmonds B, et al. Reviewing the review process: New Frontiers of Peer Review. Xjenza Online. 2016;4:82–5.
Lotriet CJ. Reviewing the review process: Identifying sources of delay. Australas Med J. 2012;5(1):26-9.
Lee Y, Kim KO, Lee Y. Publication delay of Korean medical journals. J Korean Med Sci. 2017 Aug;32(8):1235-1242.
Mendes AM, Tonin FS, Buzzi MF, Pontarolo R, Fernandez-Llimos F. Mapping pharmacy journals: A lexicographic analysis. Res Social Adm Pharm. 2019 Dec;15(12):1464-1471.
Faul F, Erdfelder E, Lang AG, Buchner A. G*Power 3: A flexible statistical power analysis program for the social, behavioral, and biomedical sciences. Behav Res Methods. 2007 May;39(2):175-91.
Fritz CO, Morris PE, Richler JJ. Effect size estimates: Current use, calculations, and interpretation. J Exp Psychol Gen. 2012 Feb;141(1):2-18.
Himmelstein D. Publication delays at PLOS and 3,475 other journals [Internet]. Satoshi Village. 2015. Available from: https://blog.dhimmel.com/plos-and-publishing-delays/ (accessed Feb 23, 2020).
Himmelstein D. The history of publishing delays [Internet]. Satoshi Village. 2016. Available from: https://blog.dhimmel.com/history-of-delays/ (accessed Feb 23, 2020).
Powell K. The Waiting Game. Nature. 2016;530:148–51.
Wallach JD, Egilman AC, Gopal AD, Swami N, Krumholz HM, Ross JS. Biomedical journal speed and efficiency: a cross-sectional pilot survey of author experiences. Res Integr Peer Rev. 2018 Jan 5;3:1.
Qunaj L, Jain RH, Atoria CL, Gennarelli RL, Miller JE, Bach PB. Delays in the publication of important clinical trial findings in oncology. JAMA Oncol. 2018 Jul 12;4(7):e180264.
Donato H, Marinho RT. Acta Médica Portuguesa and peer-review: quick and brutal! Acta Med Port. 2012 Sep-Oct;25(5):261-2.
Rivera H. Fake peer review and inappropriate authorship are real evils. J Korean Med Sci. 2018 Dec 26;34(2):e6.
Haug CJ. Peer-Review fraud - Hacking the scientific publication process. N Engl J Med. 2015 Dec 17;373(25):2393-5.
Cheung BMY. Fake peer review - too good to be true. Postgrad Med J. 2017 Aug;93(1102):498.
Hadi MA. Fake peer-review in research publication: revisiting research purpose and academic integrity. Int J Pharm Pract. 2016 Oct;24(5):309-10.
Rahman S, Baumgartner MR, Morava E, Patterson M, Peters V, Zschocke J. Peer review fraud—it’s not big and it’s not clever. J Inherit Metab Dis. 2016 Jan;39(1):1-2.
Bowman JD. Predatory publishing, questionable peer review, and fraudulent conferences. Am J Pharm Educ. 2014 Dec 15;78(10):176.
Pierson CA. Fake science and peer review: Who is minding the gate? J Am Assoc Nurse Pract. 2014 Jan;26(1):1-2.
Irwin AN, Rackham D. Comparison of the time-to-indexing in PubMed between biomedical journals according to impact factor, discipline, and focus. Res Social Adm Pharm. 2017 Mar - Apr;13(2):389-393.
Wang T, Xing QR, Wang H, Chen W. Retracted Publications in the Biomedical Literature from Open Access Journals. Sci Eng Ethics. 2019 Jun;25(3):855-868.
