Former BMJ Editor: "Most of What is Published in Journals is just Plain Wrong or Nonsense"

[Created4]

The peer review process – long considered the gold standard of quality scientific research – is a “sacred cow” that should be slaughtered, the former editor of one of the country’s leading medical journals has said.

Richard Smith, who edited the British Medical Journal for more than a decade, said there was no evidence that peer review was a good method of detecting errors and claimed that “most of what is published in journals is just plain wrong or nonsense”.

Full Article at The Independent

[jj-]

Or marketing from the drug companies.

People often cite 'studies form prestigious journals' not realizing they're basically press releases from the drug industry.

[Created4]

Or marketing from the drug companies.

People often cite 'studies form prestigious journals' not realizing they're basically press releases from the drug industry.

Yep. And those "stats" or "science" are often quoted here in support of vaccines.

"the risk of developing a permanent and serious adverse reaction from a vaccine is infinitely less than the odds of developing a permanent and serious adverse reaction to the diseases they prevent," for example, is pure marketing belief, and not scientific fact at all. The REAL evidence points in the opposite direction, such as vaccine antibodies wearing off and not preventing the disease which is being vaccinated for (e.g. pertussis), injuries and deaths due to vaccines as reported in VAERS, or compensated in the government Vacine Court, etc.

[jj-]

There is good research too, but that typically isn't highlighted. Libertarians especially should realize the damage licensing laws do to the practice of medicine.

[Zippyjuan]

Article also notes:

Dr Trish Groves, the current head of research at BMJ said that, while peer review wasn’t perfect, it was “still the best way to help research funders, conference organisers, and journal editors decide which studies to support and disseminate and to help readers, the public, patients, and healthcare providers decide what evidence to use in decision making.”

[NorthCarolinaLiberty]

Article also notes:

Of course she is going to say that. She's the current editor. If she talked about slaughtering that cow, then it would be herself.

[Created4]

Of course she is going to say that. She's the current editor. If she talked about slaughtering that cow, then it would be herself.

Exactly. Very hard to be a "whistle-blower" and hang on to one's job. Unless you work for the CDC, apparently (e.g. Dr. William Thompson).



Story here.

[jj-]

Of course she is going to say that. She's the current editor. If she talked about slaughtering that cow, then it would be herself.

Reminds me of...

It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.

[Zippyjuan]

From his original article: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1420798/

The most important question with peer review is not whether to abandon it, but how to improve it. Many ideas have been advanced to do so, and an increasing number have been tested experimentally. The options include: standardizing procedures; opening up the process; blinding reviewers to the identity of authors; reviewing protocols; training reviewers; being more rigorous in selecting and deselecting reviewers; using electronic review; rewarding reviewers; providing detailed feedback to reviewers; using more checklists; or creating professional review agencies. It might be, however, that the best response would be to adopt a very quick and light form of peer review—and then let the broader world critique the paper or even perhaps rank it in the way that Amazon asks users to rank books and CDs.

I hope that it will not seem too indulgent if I describe the far from finished journey of the BMJ to try and improve peer review. We tried as we went to conduct experiments rather than simply introduce changes.

CONCLUSION

So peer review is a flawed process, full of easily identified defects with little evidence that it works. Nevertheless, it is likely to remain central to science and journals because there is no obvious alternative, and scientists and editors have a continuing belief in peer review. How odd that science should be rooted in belief.

[NorthCarolinaLiberty]

From his original article: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1420798/

Describing this as his "original" article has no relevance here because the current, OP article discusses his current view. It looks like his views evolved until he came to his present conclusion. The OP's article read:

Dr Smith, who edited the BMJ between 1991 and 2004, is a longstanding critic of the pre-publication peer review process

Your article is from 2006. It is now 2015. It looks like Smith's views changed in 9 years.

On top of all that--the 2006 article you cite is also Smith writing for a peer reviewed journal, so he still can't be overly critical.

[Zippyjuan]

He does argue for more "post review" saying that pre- review is too costly and difficult to be done well prior to publication.

http://msc.sagepub.com/content/18/3/113.full

My conclusion is that we should scrap prepublication peer review and concentrate on postpublication peer review, which has always been the ‘real’ peer review in that it decides whether a study matters or not. By postpublication peer review I do not mean the few published comments made on papers, but rather the whole ‘market of ideas,’ which has many participants and processes and moves like an economic market to determine the value of a paper. Prepublication peer review simply obstructs this process – as happened with this important paper showing that age alone is enough for screening for cardiovascular disease.

[NorthCarolinaLiberty]

He does argue for more "post review" saying that pre- review is too costly and difficult to be done well prior to publication.

http://msc.sagepub.com/content/18/3/113.full

I don't see where he argues for "more." He says in your quote:

...postpublication peer review, which has always been the ‘real’ peer review in that it decides whether a study matters or not.

So, it looks like he wants to leave the existing post review in place and scrap pre-peer review.

[Created4]

So, it looks like he wants to leave the existing post review in place and scrap pre-peer review.

Isn't Open Access publishing the way to go? It seems to be gaining steam, and the best scholarship should rise to the top based on the merits of the research, rather than the "prestige" of the journal. This is happening already in mainstream media with the quickly accelerating death of print media journalism in the digital age.

[Created4]

PLOS (Public Library of Science) is a nonprofit publisher and advocacy organization founded to accelerate progress in science and medicine by leading a transformation in research communication.

Open Access (OA) stands for unrestricted access and unrestricted reuse. Here’s why that matters.

Most publishers own the rights to the articles in their journals. Anyone who wants to read the articles must pay to access them. Anyone who wants to use the articles in any way must obtain permission from the publisher and is often required to pay an additional fee.

Although many researchers can access the journals they need via their institution and think that their access is free, in reality it is not. The institution has often been involved in lengthy negotiations around the price of their site license and re-use of this content is limited.

Paying for access to content makes sense in the world of print publishing, where providing content to each new reader requires the production of an additional copy, but online it makes much less sense to charge for content when it is possible to provide access to all readers anywhere in the world.

PLOS Takes a Different Approach
PLOS applies the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license to works we publish. This license was developed to facilitate open access – namely, free immediate access to, and unrestricted reuse of, original works of all types. Under this license, authors agree to make articles legally available for reuse, without permission or fees, for virtually any purpose. Anyone may copy, distribute or reuse these articles, as long as the author and original source are properly cited. Additionally, the journal platform that PLOS uses to publish research articles is Open Source.

Benefits of Open Access Research
Accelerated discovery. With open access, researchers can read and build on the findings of others without restriction.
Public enrichment. Much scientific and medical research is paid for with public funds. Open Access allows taxpayers to see the results of their investment.
Improved education. Open Access means that teachers and their students have access to the latest research findings throughout the world.

PLOS

[jj-]

Isn't Open Access publishing the way to go?

I think it doesn't matter that much, because very important stuff has already been published, is accessible, and just simply ignored. Theories about cancer by Warburg, published many decades ago, which might provide the best strategy to solve it, are one example.

Some examples of valuable discoveries that are ignored:

-The so-called good fats are actually bad fats. The so-called bad fats are good fats. To get a glimpse of the good literature, look up studies about the effects of different types of fats on fatty liver disease (spoiler: saturated fats fix the problem). Just to give another quick example, medium chain saturated fat might be the best documented and safest substance to seal the leaky gut (although it should still be used carefully).

-Sugar is demonized stupidly. There is more evidence that polyunsaturated fats cause diabetes than sugar. Polyunsaturated fats damage the cells in the pancreas that produce insulin, yet no one hears about that from doctors. Link

-Thyroid problems are treated with the inactive form, yet it has been shown that 1. People with a smaller proportion of the active form of the thyroid hormone get more diseases of the brain. 2. Treatment with the inactive form of the hormone produces said proportion. 3. Treatment with both forms, like it was done in the 1940s, restores the ratio to the one found in healthy people.

-I guess because magnesium isn't patentable, it isn't emphasized that for bone density, magnesium supplementation produced better results than calcium supplementation (unless one gets a very small amount of calcium). Calcium supplementation is just about useless once you get a good amount from the diet.