Publication planning: promoting an ethics of transparency and integrity in biomedical research

Publication ethics from the ground up

“…Publication professionals can support the work of authors and contributors and provide general guidance on how to form a publication steering committee, manage publication activities, suggest target journals and congresses, provide regular progress updates and keep publication plans up to date. Medical writers, using their expertise with specific guidelines, may assist with assembling, formatting and submitting manuscripts, track author input, identify references, establish timelines and perform other functions to enhance quality and efficiency, allowing authors to concentrate on interpretation of scientific content …”

“…Auditable documentation may include the publication plan, additional documents like the RACI (responsible, accountable, consulted, informed) chart (see Table for an example), and records of reviews, author agreements and submission documentation. The specifics of a publication plan have been reported elsewhere and are discussed briefly below …”

“…A publication plan is a critical part of publication management that should be developed, maintained and regularly updated. The format of effective publication plans can vary widely.…”

“…Regardless of format, publication plans should account for all presentations and manuscripts of specific datasets, including information about venues, timing, the names of relevant meetings and journals . It may be helpful to include a schedule of planned steering committee or authoring group meetings, contact information and details about potential follow‐up work such as meta‐analyses, publications of secondary or tertiary outcomes data or book chapters.…”

“…Publication plans are documents that outline specific logistical steps for publication practices and capture publication concepts for a specific team. The best publication plans integrate regulatory and legal requirements, contextual dissemination of data, clinical relevance to patients and the intellectual interests that drive peer‐reviewed publications …”