Cross-sectional Research on Professional Medical Writing Support and the Standard of Reporting for Randomized Controlled Trials?

Introduction

Publication in a peer-reviewed journal remains the gold standard for reporting clinical study data, however it is estimated that only about half of biomedical research gets published in full, and failure to publish is connected with poor study outcomes. The pharmaceutical sector, in particular, has been chastised for failing to report on clinical trials. Clinical case study reporting must be thorough and transparent in order for others to adequately analyze and comprehend the findings. When study information is not completely revealed, researchers and physicians may overestimate the benefits or hazards of medicines.

The CONSORT checklist is a guideline for documenting primary research procedures and findings in randomized controlled trials (RCTs). Adherence to these principles, however, remains unsatisfactory, with data such as primary outcomes, sample size calculation, randomization, and allocation concealment frequently being withheld. The purpose of this cross-sectional study was to look into the link between claimed medical writing support and the quality and timeliness of articles reporting RCTs, with acceptance time measured by the period between manuscript submission and editorial acceptance by the journal.

Sample selection

This study looked at the reporting of the outcomes of pharmacological intervention RCTs published in BioMed Central journals (text box). In other publications, pilot research generated an inadequately large sample of manuscripts with acknowledged medical writing help. BioMed Central journals support the CONSORT statement and have been utilized in past investigations of CONSORT adherence.

Eligibility criteria

All main reports of parallel-group, randomised trials of pharmaceutical and dietary supplement treatments were considered. Full papers were evaluated, and the existence or absence of declared medical writing services support was confirmed. Articles lacking acknowledgements were not accepted. Duplicates, reviews, post-hoc analyses, and empirical research procedures were also removed. The two groups of articles were then pooled and sorted alphabetically by title for data gathering purposes.