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Conflicts of interest statements on biomedical papers

Author

Listed:
  • Grant Lewison

    (King’s College London)

  • Richard Sullivan

    (King’s College London)

Abstract

This paper examines the varying prevalence of conflict of interest (COI), and “no conflict”, statements on biomedical research papers, which are increasingly being required by journal editors. They are important as they may detract from the perceived objectivity of the results if the authors are in the pay of commercial companies. However, the frequency of these statements in the web of science (WoS) is only a few percent of the total number of biomedical papers. A survey of journal editors revealed that many COI statements are excluded from the WoS because they are printed separately from the acknowledgement section of the paper. One consequence of the appearance of COI statements on papers is that the WoS mistakenly includes companies who have given money to some of the researchers for unrelated work among the sponsors listed among the funding organizations, and this will distort the analysis of the funding of the research being reported in some of the papers and appears nearly to double companies’ apparent tally of papers.

Suggested Citation

  • Grant Lewison & Richard Sullivan, 2015. "Conflicts of interest statements on biomedical papers," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 102(3), pages 2151-2159, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:102:y:2015:i:3:d:10.1007_s11192-014-1507-0
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-014-1507-0
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Andreas Lundh & Marija Barbateskovic & Asbjørn Hróbjartsson & Peter C Gøtzsche, 2010. "Conflicts of Interest at Medical Journals: The Influence of Industry-Supported Randomised Trials on Journal Impact Factors and Revenue – Cohort Study," PLOS Medicine, Public Library of Science, vol. 7(10), pages 1-7, October.
    2. Grant Lewison & Valentina Markusova, 2010. "The evaluation of Russian cancer research," Research Evaluation, Oxford University Press, vol. 19(2), pages 129-144, June.
    3. John Rigby, 2013. "Looking for the impact of peer review: does count of funding acknowledgements really predict research impact?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 94(1), pages 57-73, January.
    4. Aaron S Kesselheim & Bo Wang & David M Studdert & Jerry Avorn, 2012. "Conflict of Interest Reporting by Authors Involved in Promotion of Off-Label Drug Use: An Analysis of Journal Disclosures," PLOS Medicine, Public Library of Science, vol. 9(8), pages 1-9, August.
    5. Grant Lewison & Philip Roe, 2012. "The evaluation of Indian cancer research, 1990–2010," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 93(1), pages 167-181, October.
    6. Grant Lewison & Guillermo Paraje, 2004. "The classification of biomedical journals by research level," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 60(2), pages 145-157, June.
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    Cited by:

    1. Daniele Rotolo & Michael Hopkins & Nicola Grassano, 2023. "Do funding sources complement or substitute? Examining the impact of cancer research publications," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 74(1), pages 50-66, January.
    2. Fernanda Morillo & Belén Álvarez-Bornstein, 2018. "How to automatically identify major research sponsors selecting keywords from the WoS Funding Agency field," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 117(3), pages 1755-1770, December.
    3. Magnus Eriksson & Annika Billhult & Tommy Billhult & Elena Pallari & Grant Lewison, 2020. "A new database of the references on international clinical practice guidelines: a facility for the evaluation of clinical research," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 122(2), pages 1221-1235, February.
    4. Adèle Paul-Hus & Nadine Desrochers & Rodrigo Costas, 2016. "Characterization, description, and considerations for the use of funding acknowledgement data in Web of Science," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 108(1), pages 167-182, July.
    5. Fernanda Morillo, 2016. "Public–private interactions reflected through the funding acknowledgements," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 108(3), pages 1193-1204, September.

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