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Editor adding reference to an author's work
Several years ago Author A was asked by Editor B to contribute an essay to a publication. The book took a long time to complete and underwent many modifications. When the book was published Author A noticed that several edits had been made to the text without Author A being informed and which Author A did not approve. The most notable edit is an added reference to a piece of text. The added ref… - CaseCase Closed
Letter to the editor and retraction notice
A Letter to the Editor was submitted to Journal A – this Letter contained major criticisms of a paper previously published in Journal A, in particular of the statistical analysis underpinning the conclusions and the study design, and called for its retraction. The Editor sent the Letter out for peer review and some revisions were made by the authors. Based on both the content of the Letter and… - CaseCase Closed
Questionable authorship information
We have a paper in production that presents refutations of common criticisms made of a domestic cleaning or skin care ingredient. The majority of the authors are scientific research officers of a firm that sells products containing the ingredient. One other author is stated to be associated with a university but does not appear to hold a PhD. It is stated in the corrected proofs that this in… - CaseCase Closed
Seven plagiarized manuscripts in one month by the same corresponding author
In one month we have received 11 manuscripts (9 case reports, 1 original study and 1 letter) written by authors from a European Union country. The manuscripts were submitted by the same corresponding author (author A) who was also the first author in all of the 11 manuscripts. Another author was the second author (author B) in 10 of the manuscripts. There were two other authors (authors C and D… - CaseCase Closed
How to deal with obvious but disclosed conflict of interest
We are dealing with a paper which contains an obvious but disclosed conflict of interest. The paper has two authors who are company employees (one is the CEO). The study does not directly involve their product (a medical device) but does directly involve the assessment of the broader medical service which it supports. The results of their study are favourable toward the company. All company aff… - CaseCase Closed
Retraction of article and accompanying editorial
The authors of a published article have asked to have an article retracted for internal policy reasons. However, we have solicited and published an editorial which accompanies this article and specifically references it within the text. We are unsure how to handle this. Question for COPE Council Does COPE have any policy or protocol for cases like this? … - CaseCase Closed
Query about errata
Your retraction guidelines include comments about corrections. They also advise that notices of retraction should be linked to the original retracted articles. But, it is not 100% clear whether notices of correction (that is, errata and corrigenda, as opposed to retractions) should also be linked directly to/embedded in the origi… - CaseCase Closed
Call for retraction of a commentary
A journal received two emails from different individuals, both critical of a commentary published in the journal. One cited serious errors, the other noted inaccurate statements, incorrect literature citations and fundamental flaws regarding misinterpretations or over-interpretations which could affect public health. The second email also cited the potential for the commentary to be used for (u… - CaseCase Closed
Citing a retracted paper
Our journal has recently retracted three articles after one author was found by their institution to have fabricated data and destroyed evidence. It appears that the one author acted alone; no evidence has been found of complicity by coauthors, and the institution found some evidence suggesting that the one author defrauded their coauthors. We would like to know whether future articles can cite… - CaseCase Closed
Plagiarism and publication fee
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… - CaseCase Closed
Ethical issues of responding to government agency request for information
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. The journal was subsequently contacted by two government agencies of the country… - CaseCase Closed
Author with recidivist behaviour involving simultaneous submissions
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. Journa… - CaseCase Closed
Enquiry regarding copyright/retractions
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). Having reviewed various sources of guidance, it would appear that there is some precedent for re-publication of retracted papers (suitably corrected or… - CaseCase Closed
Plagiarism case
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. Journal X has run plagiarism software on both papers to see the degree of text replication and it is not signi… - CaseCase Closed
Retraction request after university investigation found no evidence of fraud
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. Dr X is now asking the journal for… - CaseCase Closed
Image manipulation case
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. Subsequ… - CaseCase Closed
Secondary analysis of medical records and ethics committee approval
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 pati… - CaseCase Closed
Post-publication correction because of lack of consent
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. The article in question is a case study of a… - CaseCase Closed
Boundaries of duplicate submission
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 reje… - CaseCase Closed
Permission to publish a case report
A journal published ahead of print a peer-reviewed scientific letter by Drs A (corresponding), B, C, D and E with a description of four patients who underwent a certain procedure. One of the cases took place in hospital X. Dr C works at hospital X. However, the corresponding author (Dr A) and the other 2 authors (Drs B and D) do not work for hospital X. The journal received an em…