Predatory Publishing: Know the Difference Between a Financial Scheme and Scholarly Dissemination

One reason may be the pressure for researchers to get their work published, suggests Simon Helfgott, MD, a rheumatologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, director of education and fellowship training at Harvard Medical School, and physician editor of The Rheumatologist.

Dr. Helfgott

“There is pressure to publish at all costs, but if you are going to stray, there may be a price to pay,” Dr. Helfgott says. For example, researchers may be tempted to collaborate with one of these questionable publishers to get their work out there and get a publication to add to their CV. “The value of a scholarly journal depends on its reputation. When research is published in a journal with no impact factor or reputation within the community, the work is essentially lost, and it may not come to light until a scholar is seeking tenure or a new position and having their publications reviewed by colleagues.”

He says he receives multiple unsolicited messages from publications each week and admits it can be difficult to discern the good journals from the bad, because the less than desirable journals do everything they can to look respectable. For example, impact factor is one sign of a reputable journal; however, recently Dr. Helfgott received a solicitation from a journal that had created its own impact factor that looks official but is meaningless.

One important distinction that he believes must be made in this age of predatory publishers is recognizing the open-access journals with a good reputation that are respected among experts in a specific academic discipline. “The concept of open-access publication provides an important source for researchers to share their work.”

He encourages all rheumatology researchers to be more savvy when considering a journal to publish in. This can include investigating where the journal is located to check for a legitimate address on the journal’s web page and reviewing the editorial board for familiar names.

Dr. Solomon

It also pays to be wary of offers for financial payment for soliciting articles, suggests Daniel Solomon, MD, MPH, professor of medicine in rheumatology and Matthew H. Liang Distinguished Chair at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School. Like Drs. Hannan and Helfgott, Dr. Solomon receives multiple unsolicited offers each month to serve on publication editorial boards or share research for publication.

These requests are usually from journals that have names that sound very similar to well-established journals, but he says, “a scan through their published work does not show the level of rigorous review that journals with well-known reputations engage in.” He believes there is still a lack of awareness in the rheumatology community about the prevalence and risks associated with predatory publishers.

Learn from Others

When in doubt about the legitimacy of a journal solicitation, ask colleagues, Dr. Hannan advises. One of Dr. Hannan’s junior faculty members was deceived by a predatory solicitation to present a paper at a conference several years ago. After sending her paper and booking her flight and hotel reservations, she soon received a bill for $5,000 for publication fees, followed by a second bill for $6,000 for incidental fees. She promptly removed her paper and ceased dealing with the publisher, although she received numerous messages and bills requiring payment with late fees attached and threats the bills would go to a collections agency. Eventually, the messages and threats stopped.