Peer review

Written evidence submitted by Dr Edmund Lamb,
Editor-in-Chief, Annals of Clinical Biochemistry (PR 05)

1. I am responding to your request for information on the peer review process as Editor-in-Chief of the Annals of Clinical Biochemistry.

2. The Annals of Clinical Biochemistry is the professional journal of the Association for Clinical Biochemistry. Currently in its 48th year of existence, the Annals publishes fully refereed papers of international authorship that contribute to existing knowledge in all fields of clinical biochemistry, especially that pertaining to the understanding, diagnosis and treatment of human disease. It also publishes papers on immunology, genetics, biotechnology, haematology, computing and management where they have both biochemical and clinical relevance. Papers describing evaluation or implementation of commercial reagent kits or the performance of new analysers require substantial original information before being considered. Research undertaken in non-human animals will not be considered for publication in the Annals. The journal is published bi-monthly. Its 2009 impact factor was 1.917.

3. All original papers submitted to the Annals are subjected to peer review, providing they fit within the scope of the journal. Each manuscript is assigned to one of the journals Associate Editors, who is then at liberty to choose appropriate peer reviewers. Typically, each manuscript is sent to two peer reviewers who will be experts in the field, either known to the Associate Editor through his or her own specialist interests or found by searching an electronic database and choosing an appropriate expert based on their publication record.

4. Peer review serves a valuable role, identifying shortcomings in research design or process that could only be appreciated by an expert and pointing the Associate Editor towards suggested ways in which the manuscript could be improved. Occasionally reviewers will identify duplicate publications or plagiarism; in the latter case guidance from the Committee on Publication Ethics (www.publicationethics.org) is followed. Overall the peer review process protects the scientific community and the public from erroneous science

5. Peer reviewers are given three weeks to provide their review on a manuscript back to the Associate Editor. The entire process is handled within an electronic manuscript handling system (Manuscript Central). In addition to free text comments, from 2009 the reviewers have also been asked to complete a structured review in which the manuscript is scored for attributes including validity of hypothesis, appropriateness of experimental design, adequacy of statistics, originality and conformity with international guidelines (STARD,1 CONSORT,2 STROBE3 as appropriate).

6. Upon receipt of both peer reviewers reports the Associate Editor will then make a decision on the suitability of the manuscript for publication. Acceptance or rejection is based not only on the reviewer’s reports but on other factors such as the suitability of the material for publication in the Annals (e.g. its likely interest to our readership) and the Associate Editors own opinion of the work. The decision is in the hands of the Associate Editor, although he/she may seek advice from myself as Editor-in-Chief. It is unusual for a manuscript to be accepted without at least going through some revision following the reviewers comments. The decision is made through Manuscript Central with the decision letter (e-mail) being sent from the Associate Editor to the contact author: peer reviewers are blind-copied into the decision letter. Authors are not aware of the identity of the peer reviewers and the peer reviewers are not aware of each others identity. The Associate Editor has the opportunity to score the peer reviewers report (based on timeliness and relevance): this score is used when considering whether to use the peer reviewer again in the future.

7. I hope that this clarifies the peer review process in place for manuscripts submitted to the Annals of Clinical biochemistry. Please feel free to come back to me with any further questions.

Dr Edmund Lamb

Editor-in-Chief, Annals of Clinical Biochemistry

11 February 2011

journal http://acb.rsmjournals.com

submissions http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/acb

References:

1. Bossuyt PM, Reitsma JB, Bruns DE, et al. for the STARD Group. Towards complete and accurate reporting of studies of diagnostic accuracy: the STARD initiative. Ann Clin Biochem 2003;40:357–63

2. Moher D, Schultz KF, Altman DG for the CONSORT Group. The CONSORT statement: revised recommendations for improving the quality of reports of parallel-group randomization trials. Lancet 2001;357:1191–4

3. von Elm E, Altman DG, Egger M, Pocock SJ, Gøtzsche PC, Vandenbroucke JP for the STROBE Initiative. Strengthening the reporting of observational studies in epidemiology (STROBE) statement: guidelines for reporting observational studies. BMJ 2007;335:806–8