Publisher investigating paper a lucrative scale is based on following Retraction Watch reporting

Donald Morisky

The publishing firm Wiley says it is investigating a pivotal paper about a controversial public health tool after Retraction Watch reported on a robust critique of the article which highlighted a number of potentially serious flaws with the research.

We’re talking about the Morisky Medication Adherence Scale (MMAS), whose developer, Donald Morisky, has been hitting researchers with hefty licensing fees — or demands to retract — for nearly two decades. 

One of the key papers supporting the validity of the MMAS-8 (the second iteration of the MMAS) was a 2008 article by Morisky and colleagues in the Journal of Clinical Hypertension. 

Continue reading Publisher investigating paper a lucrative scale is based on following Retraction Watch reporting

Lancet retracts 10-year-old case report

Nihon University School of Medicine

The Lancet has retracted a decade-old case report by a group from Japan after concluding that the authors misrepresented the originality of the work. 

The paper was a case report, titled “Hidden Harm,” by a team at Nihon University School of Medicine in Tokyo. The authors described a 46-year-old woman with a history of self-harming behaviors they ultimately attributed to a previously undetected neuroendocrine tumor called a pheochromocytoma.

According to the retraction notice, however, the tumor wasn’t the only thing about the paper that was hidden. The authors also misled the Lancet when they said they hadn’t published about the case when they submitted their writeup about the case — a fact unknown to the journal until this summer:

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Company fires employee, ends cash for citation scheme following Retraction Watch post

A company that had offered payment for citations of articles in various journals has ended the practice, and fired the staffer it said was responsible, following reporting by Retraction Watch.

On August 31, we reported that Innoscience Innoscience Research, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, was offering $6 per citation of papers in five different journals, and up to five cites, or $30, per paper, or $150 in total across all five journals. Since then, two journals have distanced themselves from the scheme.

Yesterday, Innoscience told us by email:

Continue reading Company fires employee, ends cash for citation scheme following Retraction Watch post

Another journal distances itself from cash for citations after Retraction Watch report

A second journal has said it was unaware of a cash for citations scheme that named it as a participant, following our reporting in August.

The Journal of Clinical and Translational Research (JCTR) was one of five journals listed by Innoscience Research that Innoscience would pay $6 per citation to its work, as we reported on August 31. On October 9, another of those journals said it “will not entertain cash requests from the individuals who claim to have cited our articles, nor shall we pay up.”

In “JCTR’s statement on ‘paid citations’ reported by Retraction Watch,” dated October 10, editor in chief Michal Heger writes:

Continue reading Another journal distances itself from cash for citations after Retraction Watch report

Paper linking COVID-19 vaccines to myocarditis is temporarily removed without explanation

A paper claiming that myocarditis cases spiked after teenagers began receiving COVID-19 vaccines has earned a “temporary removal” — without any explanation from the publisher.

[Please see an update on this post.]

The article, “A Report on Myocarditis Adverse Events in the U.S. Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS) in Association with COVID-19 Injectable Biological Products,” was published in Current Problems in Cardiology, an Elsevier journal, on October 1.

It was co-authored by Jessica Rose and Peter McCullough, whose affiliations are listed as the Public Health Policy Initiative at the Institute of Pure and Applied Knowledge — a group that has been critical of vaccines and of the response to COVID-19 and has funded one study that was retracted earlier this year — and Texas A&M’s Baylor Dallas campus. [See update at the end of the post.]

Continue reading Paper linking COVID-19 vaccines to myocarditis is temporarily removed without explanation

Weekend reads: Attacks on scientists; NAS ousts researcher; how much it costs to publish

Before we present this week’s Weekend Reads, a question: Do you enjoy our weekly roundup? If so, we could really use your help. Would you consider a tax-deductible donation to support Weekend Reads, and our daily work? Thanks in advance.

The week at Retraction Watch featured:

Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up to 166. And there are now more than 30,000 retractions in our database.

Here’s what was happening elsewhere (some of these items may be paywalled, metered access, or require free registration to read):

Continue reading Weekend reads: Attacks on scientists; NAS ousts researcher; how much it costs to publish

Publisher retracts paper with ethics committee discrepancy after question from Retraction Watch

Photo by Bilal Kamoon via flickr

Dove, a publisher owned by Taylor & Francis, has retracted a paper published last year after a Retraction Watch reader pointed out that the authors’ statements on ethical approval made no sense.

Dove’s Diabetes, Metabolic Syndrome and Obesity: Targets and Therapy published the article, “Serum Human Epididymis Protein 4 is a Potential Biomarker for Early Chronic Kidney Disease in an Obese Population,” in April 2021. In August, we received an email from a puzzled reader which read, in part:

Continue reading Publisher retracts paper with ethics committee discrepancy after question from Retraction Watch

A correction is retracted (sort of)

Thanks to a publisher’s error, a group of infectious disease researchers has experienced a double negative for their 2020 article on tick-borne illness in South Africa. 

The paper, “Serum-free in vitro cultivation of Theileria annulata and Theileria parva schizont-infected lymphocytes,” appeared in Transboundary and Emerging Diseases, a Wiley title. The authors were affiliated with institutions in Europe, Africa, the Middle East and the United States. 

Earlier this year, the authors corrected their article. The notice, dated May 26, reads: 

Continue reading A correction is retracted (sort of)

‘We have done a terrible job’: Journal retracts, replaces paper on mosquito-borne infections

Image by WikiImages from Pixabay 

A virology journal has retracted and replaced a 2021 article on mosquito-borne infections in Africa after one of the authors identified errors in the publication — an episode that has prompted a change in practice at the journal to avoid similar issues in the future. 

The article, “Mosquito-borne arboviruses in Uganda: history, transmission and burden,” was written by a group in the United Kingdom and Uganda and appeared in the Journal of General Virology last June. 

According to the retraction notice: 

Continue reading ‘We have done a terrible job’: Journal retracts, replaces paper on mosquito-borne infections

Journal distances itself from cash for citations scheme after Retraction Watch report

A journal that appeared to be involved in a scheme in which authors were paid bonuses to cite its papers has said it “will not entertain cash requests from the individuals who claim to have cited our articles, nor shall we pay up.”

The comments come about a month after a Retraction Watch post detailing the scheme by Innoscience Research listing five journals, one of which was the International Journal of Bioprinting. Innoscience, who has not responded to requests for comment, does not publish the IJB; Whoice does. It’s unclear whether there is a relationship between the two companies.

In a statement dated October 9, the IJB wrote:

Continue reading Journal distances itself from cash for citations scheme after Retraction Watch report