ArticlePloS one2018
Conflicts of interest of editors of medical journals.
Article in PloS one, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 6 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
6 citing papers in PubMed.
- The disclosure of potential conflicts of interest among editors and members of editorial boards in leading ethics journals.Research integrity and peer review · 2025Article
- Conflict of Interest and Plastic Surgery Journal Editors: The Problem and the Solution.Annals of plastic surgery · 2023Article
- Nonresearch Pharmaceutical Industry Payments to Oncology Physician Editors.The oncologist · 2020Article
- Observational
- Editors Should Declare Conflicts of Interest.Journal of bioethical inquiry · 2019Article
- White paper: statement on conflicts of interest.Intensive care medicine · 2018Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundAlmost all medical journals now require authors to publicly disclose conflicts of interests (COI). The same standard and scrutiny is rarely employed for the editors of the journals although COI may affect editorial decisions.
methodsWe conducted a retrospective observational study to determine the prevalence and magnitude of financial relationships among editors of 60 influential US medical journals (10 each for internal medicine and five subspecialties: cardiology, gastroenterology, neurology, dermatology and allergy & immunology). Open Payments database was reviewed to determine the percentage of physician editors receiving payments and the nature and amount of these payments.
findings703 unique physician editors were included in our analysis. 320/703 (46%) received 8659 general payments totaling $8,120,562. The median number of payments per editor was 9 (IQR 3-26) and the median amount per payment was $91 (IQR $21-441). The median total payment received by each editor in one year was $4,364 (IQR $319-23,143). 152 (48%) editors received payments more than $5,000 in a year, a threshold considered significant by the National Institutes of Health. COI policies for editors were available for 34/60 (57%) journals but only 7/34 (21%) publicly reported the disclosures and only 2 (3.%) reported the dollar amount received.
interpretationA significant number of editors of internal medicine and subspecialty medical journals have financial COI and very few are publicly disclosed. Specialty journal editors have more COI compared to general medicine journal editors. Current policies for disclosing COI for editors are inconsistent and do not comply with the recommended standards.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.