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2016

Case

Plagiarism and publication fee

16-32

A journal’s editors were informed about a plagiarism case just before the last step in the volume publication process. The publication fee for the paper was already paid by the author and the author completed and signed the publication agreement in which confirmed the paper's originality. The author was informed of the plagiarism issue and also that the paper would be withdrawn from publication. The author then requested reimbursement of the payment. 

Case

Ethical issues of responding to government agency request for information

16-31

A journal published several articles, reviewed by reviewers recommended by the author, that were identified as suspect. After a thorough investigation, the journal determined that almost all of the peer review responses for these articles were fabricated - the result of identity misappropriation and fraud.  

Case

Author with recidivist behaviour involving simultaneous submissions

16-30

An author submitted manuscript A to Journal 1 and to Journal 2 in consecutive months, both journals published by the same publisher. The author had previously submitted another manuscript to Journal 3 and informed the journal that the paper had been already published by another journal when the proofs were received. Journal 1 and Journal 2 have decided to withdraw the manuscript. 

Case

Enquiry regarding copyright/retractions

16-29

A journal received a paper that had previously been retracted from another publisher’s journal as a result of malpractice in the peer review process (a result of reviewer/editor misconduct rather than actions on the part of the authors). 

Case

Plagiarism case

16-38

Journal X was contacted by Author A, who claimed that a paper published in that journal ten years previously (by Author B) was plagiarised from Author A’s article in Journal Y published approximately ten years prior to that. Author A requested the retraction of Author B’s paper.

Case

Retraction request after university investigation found no evidence of fraud

16-28

Dr X claimed to have found fabrication and falsification of data in an article submitted for publication by Dr Y. Dr Y’s university investigated and found no evidence of fraud but a genuine error in the figure. Dr X provided more information and a further investigation was initiated. It again dismissed the complaint as unfounded. The paper was then published.

Case

Image manipulation case

16-27

A journal was contacted by a non-anonymous whistleblower pointing out problems with two figures in a published paper. The journal wrote to the authors, who provided them with films for the gels and an explanation and additional figure data for the histology image, where a mistake was made when assembling the images. The journal published an erratum and informed the whistleblower.

Case

Secondary analysis of medical records and ethics committee approval

16-26

A journal received a manuscript using secondary analysis of existing medical records in which there was no indication that ethics approval was obtained from a recognized ethics review board or that participants gave their informed consent to be included in the study. Instead, the authors explained that the study had been based on a secondary analysis of existing medical records and that no patient information had been passed on to a third party.

Case

Post-publication correction because of lack of consent

16-25

An article that has been published in our journal has subsequently been found to have serious ethical issues. The authors did not seek the correct ethics approval from their institution before conducting the research (which involves human subjects). They also did not obtain informed consent from the research participants prior to publication. 

Case

Boundaries of duplicate submission

16-24

A paper was submitted to journal A. The reviewers were enthusiastic but raised substantive concerns. The editorial decision was 'reject with resubmission allowed', providing the authors the opportunity to submit a revision if they feel all concerns can be addressed. The authors elected to submit substantially the same report to journal B. The outcome was essentially the same; the paper was rejected in its current form, but a revision was invited.

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