The week at Retraction Watch featured a peer review nightmare come true, and a look at why publishing negative findings is hard. Here’s what was happening elsewhere:
There’s good news and bad news in radiology research, according to a new study: The number of retractions is increasing in radiology journals, but the rate of retraction remains lower than that seen in biomedical journals outside the field of radiology. According to the study in the American Journal of Roentgenology, between 1986 and 2001, … Continue reading Do radiology journals retract fewer papers? New study suggests yes
A Toronto hospital network is keeping two researchers’ labs closed even after an Ontario court quashed part of a misconduct finding by the institution. Some background: After the University Health Network found evidence of falsified data, Sylvia Asa stepped down as Program Medical Director of the Laboratory Medicine Program, the largest hospital diagnostic laboratory in Canada. Due to the investigation, UHN suspended the labs … Continue reading Sanction for Toronto researchers upheld despite court challenge
Embattled trachea surgeon Paolo Macchiarini, who has spent more than a year fighting misconduct allegations, is defending the ethical oversight behind one of his seminal papers published in The Lancet. The 2011 paper “Tracheobronchial transplantation with a stem-cell-seeded bioartificial nanocomposite: a proof-of-concept study” described a first-of-its-kind procedure: A 36-year-old man with recurrent tracheal cancer received an artificial … Continue reading Macchiarini defends ethics of 2011 Lancet paper
Anders Hamsten announced he would be resigning as vice-chancellor from Karolinska Institutet (KI) in the early hours of Saturday, February 13. In a press release we received at 12:16 a.m. local time in Stockholm, Hamsten issued the following statement: Following the criticism on the so called Macchiarini affair at KI I conclude it will be hard … Continue reading Karolinska vice-chancellor resigns following criticism of Macchiarini investigation
The media has been abuzz in the last few weeks with developments in the ongoing story about “super surgeon” Paolo Macchiarini. We’ve been covering the allegations against him for years (and invited him to publish a guest post on our site). Below, we present a timeline of recent events, to keep you abreast of what we know … Continue reading Reading about embattled trachea surgeon Paolo Macchiarini? Here’s what you need to know
The week at Retraction Watch featured a paper on reincarnation being retracted because it was plagiarized from Wikipedia, the swift retraction of a paper claiming that women’s makeup use was tied to testosterone levels, and a lot of news about trachea surgeon Paolo Macchiarini. Here’s what was happening elsewhere:
The Karolinska Institutet University Board announced today it was issuing a new external investigation of trachea surgeon Paolo Macchiarini, looking into questions about his recruitment and the handling of previous allegations of misconduct. According to a press release: The University Board deems such an inquiry to be an important part of restoring the confidence of the … Continue reading Karolinska orders new investigation of trachea surgeon Macchiarini
Karolinska Institutet announced today it would not extend the contract of star surgeon Paolo Macchiarini. He has been instructed to “phase out” his research from now until November 30. According to a press release issued today:
If audits work for the Internal Revenue Service, could they also work for science? We’re pleased to present a guest post from Viraj Mane, a life sciences commercialization manager in Toronto, and Amy Lossie at the National Institutes of Health, who have a unique proposal for how to improve the quality of papers: Random audits of … Continue reading Do scientists need audits?