Reporting guidelines and journal quality in otolaryngology

Adherence to Reporting Guidelines in Major Otolaryngology Publications

The aim of this study is to determine the adherence rate to reporting guidelines in published otolaryngology research. We performed an evidence-based review of all original clinical research published in 2021 in five otolaryngology journals for adherence to the appropriate guideline for the study type by evaluating whether the corresponding reporting guideline was mentioned in the body of the published manuscript. There were 1140 original research articles included in this study. Most studies were observational, for which the STROBE reporting guidelines are recommended (n = 791, 70.3%). All studies had an average adherence rate of 16.8% (n = 192/1140). The STROBE adherence rate was 4.9%, with JAMA Otolaryngology having the highest proportion of observation studies using the STROBE guidelines (23/49, 46.9%). Reporting guidelines are important tools to use in presenting original research. The use of these guidelines varies in the otolaryngology literature and highlights the ongoing need to support research reproducibility and usefulness.

Keys for successful publication in Eur Ann Otorhinolaryngol Head Neck Dis: A STROBE analysis of peer reviews of articles submitted in 2020-2021

OBJECTIVE

To evaluate reviewing and editorial decision for articles submitted to the European Annals of Otorhinolaryngology Head & Neck Diseases.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

A retrospective analysis was made of reviewers' comments on 1,133 scientific articles (700 original articles, 96 literature reviews, and 337 case reports), originating from 69 countries, consecutively submitted on-line between January 1st, 2020 and December 31st, 2021. The main objective was to document the acceptance rate and decision time. Accessory objectives were to synthesize the main comments and to screen for correlations between acceptance and the main characteristics of first authors, articles and reviewers' comments.

RESULTS

In total, 4.1% of submitted articles were accepted. Median decision time differed significantly (P<0.0001), at 1 month in case of refusal and 4 months in case of acceptance. Reviewers mentioned failure to adhere to the journal's authors' guide, to use the appropriate EQUATOR guidelines and to adopt the recommended P<0.005 significance threshold in 94.8%, 54.2%, and 39.9% of cases, respectively. On multivariate analysis, 3 variables significantly impacted acceptance, which increased from 1.3% to 44.6% (P<0.0001) when an appropriate EQUATOR guideline was used and from 0.3% to 57.4% (P<0.0001) when the significance threshold was set at P<0.005, and decreased from 10.5% to 1.1% (P=0.0001) when the article did not originate from a French-speaking country (member of the Francophonie organization).

CONCLUSION

Adhesion to modern scientific medical writing rules increased acceptance rates for articles in the European Annals of Otorhinolaryngology Head & Neck Diseases. Teaching modern scientific medical writing needs to be enhanced in otorhinolaryngology.

Intervention reporting of clinical trials published in high-impact cardiology journals: effect of the TIDieR checklist and guide

BACKGROUND

Randomised controlled trials (RCTs) provide the highest-level of evidence among primary research in cardiovascular medicine. Yet, even the best trial may be less useful if it fails to provide an accurate means of reproducibility. Unfortunately, discrepancies in the standards of trial reporting have been persistent in previous trials. The Template for Intervention Description and Replication (TIDieR) checklist aims to improve research efficacy by setting standards for quality intervention reporting and reproducibility. The goal of this study was to assess adherence to the TIDieR checklist among RCTs published in cardiovascular health journals. We also compared the quality of intervention reporting before and after the publication of TIDieR.

METHODS

This cross-sectional, methodological study analysed 101 trials published within high-impact cardiology journals. Our primary objective was to assess overall adherence to the TIDieR checklist. Our secondary objective was to use an interrupted time-series analysis to determine if intervention reporting increased following the publication of TIDieR in March 2014. Additionally, we used generalised estimating equations to identify trial characteristics associated with intervention reporting.

RESULTS

Trials in our sample reported 8.6/12 TIDieR checklist items, on average. The most under-reported items were those for describing the expertise of the interventionists and for describing the location of the intervention.

CONCLUSION

Improved outcome reporting and intervention reproducibility among RCTs are greatly needed in cardiovascular medicine. Clinicians and researchers should advocate for the ethical publication of complete, translatable and replicable clinical research results.

Publication integrity in orthopaedic journals: the self-citation in orthopaedic research (SCOR) threshold

BACKGROUND

The impact factor (IF) is the most commonly used bibliometric method for rating academic journals. However, the practice of journals' self-citation may artificially elevate the IF. Additional bibliometric methods including Eigenfactor scale, SCImago Journal Ranking (SJR), and corrected IF (cIF) have been created. Comparing general-interest and specialized orthopaedic journals, the aims of this study were to assess: (1) the effect of journal´s self-citation on IF; (2) differences in bibliometric analysis; and (3) to determine thresholds for monitoring self-citation practices by defining the self-citation in orthopaedic research (SCOR) Threshold.

METHODS

The journal citation reports and SCImago Journal and Country Rank databases were queried for orthopaedic journals from 1997 to 2017. The following bibliometrics were compared between general-interest and specialized journals: IF, cIF, Eigenfactor, self-citation rates, and SJR. A novel metric, the cIF ratio, was proposed to represent the relationship between a journal's IF and cIF. Thresholds for cIF were based on statistical outliers of cIF ratio within general-interest and specialized journals were calculated. Outliers were defined as data points that were greater than the third quartile by 1.5 times the interquartile range using the last 10 years studied (2007-2017).

RESULTS

Specialized orthopaedic journals had a higher median self-citation rates compared to general-interest journals (11.85% vs. 6.36%, p < 0.001). Overall, cIF ratio declined over study period, and general-interest journals had a lower cIF ratio than specialized journals (8.77% vs. 19.54%, p < 0.001). Overall, general-interest journals had more favourable values for the bibliometric indices studied compared to specialized journals The SCOR threshold for cIF ratio was determined as 25.4% for general-interest journals and 53.3% for specialized journals.

CONCLUSION

Overall, self-citation occurs at a higher rate in specialized versus general-interest orthopaedic journals. We propose the use of a cIF ratio along with the SCOR threshold as a tool to evaluate and monitor journal self-citation practices in orthopaedic research.