Study indicates top medical journals published significant number of ghostwritten articles

"Six of the top medical journals published a significant number of articles in 2008 that were written by ghostwriters financed by drug companies," according to a study in The Journal of the American Medical Association. The findings are of "concern" because "the work of industry-sponsored writers has the potential to introduce bias, affecting treatment decisions by doctors and, ultimately, patient care," the researchers said. The study included "authors of 630 articles who responded anonymously to an online questionnaire." Researchers found that "7.8 percent acknowledged contributions to their articles by people whose work should have qualified them to be named as authors on the papers but who were not listed."
       
The New England Journal of Medicine had "the highest rate of ghostwritten articles" at 10.9 percent, while "Nature Medicine had the lowest rate of unnamed writers, at two percent." Annette Flanagin, managing deputy editor of the Journal of the American Medical Association, said that with ghostwriters, "you lose transparency and potential accountability." She added, "Why would they be ghosted if they didn't have an agenda?"

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