September 2013

Volume 30, Issue 3

Editorial - The Challenges of Scientific Publishing

Authors: K.A. Eaton
doi: 10.1922/CDH_201303Robinson02

Abstract

Peter Robinson is Professor of Dental Public Health at the School of Clinical Dentistry at the University of Sheffield and an Associate Editor of Community Dental Health. He attended this meeting as a Section Editor of BMC Oral Health. Kenneth Eaton is a Visiting Professor at University College London, Eastman and King’s College London Dental Institutes and an Honorary Professor at the University of Kent. He is also the Chair of the British Dental Editors Forum and chaired the meeting reported in this editorial A forum for editors, associate editors, publishers and others interested in publishing scientific literature was held in Seattle on 20 March 2013, just before the opening of the annual meeting of the International Association for Dental Research (IADR). The forum considered the challenges for publishing scientific literature over the next 20 years and the meeting took the form of a panel discussion with questions from the audience. The panellists were editors Professor Will Giannobile (Journal of Dental Research), Professor Rex Holland (Archives of Oral Biology), Dr Stephen Hancocks (British Dental Journal) and Professor Peter Robinson (Oral Health section of Biomedical Central). The forum was chaired by Professor Kenneth Eaton (editor of Oral Health and Dental Management) and over 100 delegates attended. Each panel member had suggested five topics for discussion. Some related to current difficulties whereas others looked to the future. Those topics included: • Open access publishing • Increases in the number of papers • Greater spread in the quality of manuscripts • Ethic concerns including research integrity, plagiarism and falsification • The standardisation of methods and research protocols • Stronger peer review • The adoption of international codes of publishing standards • The challenges of secondary publishing • Electronic discussion of recently published studies. • The use of video in methods sections • Clinical trial registration In a free-ranging discussion the forum focussed on a smaller number of key topics. There was agreement that many more manuscripts, than five years ago, were being submitted to journals, especially those with a Medline listing. In some respects this is a good thing. A growth in scientific publishing and the need to publish for academic advancement is a sign of the growth of science. It represents the growth of a model of human endeavour which readers of this journal should welcome.

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Other articles in this issue

Article Pages Access
Editorial - The Challenges of Scientific Publishing 130-131 Download
The origins of BASCD and the Specialty of Dental Public Health: Some personal memories 132-133 Download
Dental Public Health in Action - Oral health education and disease prevention in primary dental care: Insight from a pilot intervention targeting children aged 0-7 years in northeast England 134-137 Download
Caries prevalence in 12-year-old children from Germany: Results of the 2009 national survey 138-142 Download
Longitudinal register study of attendance frequencies in public and private dental services in Finland 143-148 Download
The geographic distribution of patients seeking emergency dental care at the Royal Dental Hospital of Melbourne, Australia 149-154 Download
Using GIS to analyse dental practice distribution in Indiana, USA 155-160 Download
Oral health care services utilisation in the adult US population: Medical Expenditure Panel Survey 2006 161-167 Download
Dental infections increase the likelihood of hospital admissions among adult patients with sickle cell disease 168-172 Download
Preschool teachers as agents of oral health promotion: an intervention study in Sri Lanka 173-177 Download
Oral health literacy and information sources among adults in Tehran, Iran 178-182 Download
Child oral health-related quality of life (COHQoL), enamel defects of the first permanent molars and caries experience among children in Western Australia 183-188 Download
Oral health-related quality of life in non-syndromic cleft lip and/or palate patients: a systematic review 189-195 Download

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