Ethics in biomedical scientific publication. A review of the publications retracted in Spain
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2019.mar.22Keywords:
Scholarly communication, Scientific publication, Retractions, Scientific misconduct, Scientific fraud, Biomedical scientific publications, Biomedical journals, Biomedical research, Ethics, Spain.Abstract
The main causes of retraction of biomedical articles with affiliated authors in Spain, as well as factors to interpret this phenomenon are identified. A total of 132 retractations have been analyzed, being the first cause of retraction the fabrication/falsification of data. Duplicated or reused images, errors admitted and not malicious in the data or procedures, duplicate or fragmented articles, and plagiarism are also frequent retraction causes. Retractions are not frequent, accounting for only 0.11% of the production of Spanish authors. But beyond that, retractions are an important correction and alert mechanism for scientific publications that ensures the reliability of the medical literature, its quality and progress.
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