Acta Dermato-Venereologica 99-1CompleteContent | Page 17

58 See also Commentary, p. 4 INVESTIGATIVE REPORT Knowledge and Influence of Predatory Journals in Dermatology: A Pan-Austrian Survey Georg RICHTIG 1,2 , Markus RICHTIG 2 , Wolfram HOETZENECKER 3 , Werner SAXINGER 4 , Bernhard LANGE-ASSCHENFELDT 5 , Andreas STEINER 6 , Robert STROHAL 6 , Christian POSCH 8,9 , Johann W. BAUER 10 , Robert R. MÜLLEGGER 11 , Teresa DEINLEIN 2 , Norbert SEPP 12 , Beatrix VOLC-PLATZER 13 , Van Anh NGUYEN 14 , Matthias SCHMUTH 14 , Christoph HOELLER 15 , Gudrun PREGARTNER 16 and Erika RICHTIG 2 Otto Loewi Research Center, Pharmacology Section, 2 Department of Dermatology, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Departments of Dermatology: 3 Kepler University Hospital, Linz, 4 Klinikum Wels-Grieskirchen, Wels, 6 Municipal Hospital Hietzing, Vienna, 10 University Hospital of the Paracelsus Medical University, Salzburg, 11 State Hospital Wiener Neustadt, Wiener Neustadt, 12 Ordensklinikum Linz, Linz, 13 Donauspital, University affiliated Hospital and 15 Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Departments of Dermatology and Venereology: 5 State Hospital Klagenfurt, Klagenfurt am Wörthersee, 7 Federal Academic Teaching Hospital of Feldkirch, Feldkirch, 8 Rudolfstiftung Hospital, Vienna, 9 School of Medicine, Sigmund Freud University, Vienna and 14 Medical University of Innsbruck, Innsbruck, and 16 Institute for Medical Informatics, Statistics and Documentation, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria 1 The aim of this study was to assess the knowledge and influence of predatory journals in the field of der- matology in Austria. A total of 286 physicians (50.5% men) completed a questionnaire. The vast majority of subjects read scientific articles (n  = 281, 98.3%) and took them into consideration in their clinical decision- making (n  = 271, 98.5% of participants that regularly read scientific literature). Open access was known by 161 (56.3%), predatory journals by 84 (29.4%), and the Beall’s list by 19 physicians (6.7%). A total of 117 participants (40.9%) had been challenged by patients with results from the scientific literature, including 9 predatory papers. Participants who knew of preda- tory journals had a higher level of education as well as scientific experience, and were more familiar with the open-access system (p  < 0.001). These results in- dicate that the majority of dermatologists are not fa- miliar with predatory journals. This is particularly the case for physicians in training and in the early stages of their career. Key words: predatory journal; survey; physician; dermatolo- gist; knowledge; influence. Accepted Sep 11, 2018; Epub ahead of print Sep 12, 2018 Acta Derm Venereol 2019; 99: 58–62. Corr: Georg Richtig, Otto Loewi Research Center, Pharmacology Section, Medical University of Graz, Universitätsplatz 4, AT-8010 Graz, Austria. E-mail: [email protected] T here has been a continuous increase in papers pu- blished every year since the 1950s (1). Publishing has changed over the last decade due to easier access to the World Wide Web, which enables rapid distribution of information. Over the same period, large mainstream publishers of subscription-based journals began publish­ ing articles in electronic format on the internet (2, 3). This occurred in reaction to the establishment of the open-access (OA) movement in the 2000s (2). The open- access model is characterized by journals that make their articles widely available by distributing them online. Furthermore, in contrast to subscription-based journals, open-access articles are freely available to research doi: 10.2340/00015555-3037 Acta Derm Venereol 2019; 99: 58–62 SIGNIFICANCE Predatory journals are an emerging problem within the scientific community, but knowledge of these journals and their influence on dermatology, have not been investiga- ted. Most dermatologists are not aware of predatory jour- nals, but scientifically active and older physicians are more likely to know of predatory journals. Some physicians have been confronted by patients with predatory literature, thus it is necessary to educate doctors about this issue. institutions and any kind of readership. Authors have to pay a publication fee, known as article processing charges (APC), to publish their work. An advantage of open-access journals is, however, that the time from submission to publication is generally shorter than for traditional journals; this guarantees more rapid publica- tion, and, since it is freely available to all readers, also guarantees broader visibility (4). However, with the increase in open-access journals, and the growing tendency of publishing articles online only, an increasing number of publishers and journals are exploiting the open-access model by corrupting the peer- review process with the goal of increasing the number of published articles and thus profiting from publication fees (5). This problematic issue has been addressed by Jeffrey Beall, a librarian at the University of Colorado, who created a list of journals and publishers with suspicious publishing ethics. Since most of these journals were in- terested only in increasing their revenue, he named them “predatory journals” and “predatory publishers” (6). Given this background, this study aimed to investigate whether physicians had knowledge of predatory journals and how this influenced their daily practice routines. A survey was developed, and a pan-Austrian questionnaire- based study conducted in all dermatological departments and among all registered dermatologists. MATERIALS AND METHODS Dermatologists of all educational levels were eligible to partici- pate in this prospective pan-Austrian survey. The study consisted This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC license. www.medicaljournals.se/acta Journal Compilation © 2019 Acta Dermato-Venereologica.