EDITOR'S NOTE
The Journal was notified about a complaint regarding a June 2001 article “Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Comparison of Imipramine and Paroxetine in the Treatment of Bipolar Depression” by Nemeroff CB et al. (http://dx.doi.org/10.1176/appi.ajp.158.6.906).
Part of the complaint alleged that the paper had been written and submitted to the Journal by a commercial medical writer, Scientific Therapeutics Information (STI), on behalf of SmithKlineBeecham (now GlaxoSmithKline [GSK]).
In response to our inquiry, a senior official at STI disclosed the following information to the Journal:
Based on my review of our records, STI was hired by GSK to provide editorial assistance on a study report entitled “A Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Comparison of Imipramine and Paroxetine in the Treatment of Bipolar Depression”. After discussion with the GSK authors Ivan Gergel, Rosemary Oakes, and Cornelius Pitts, STI was provided with a copy of the clinical study report to review and develop a rough draft. Simultaneously, the GSK clinical development team identified the external authors for this manuscript (Dr Dwight Evans, Laszlo Gyulai, Gary Sachs, and Charles Bowden). STI provided the first rough draft after the clinical development team and statistician from GSK verified the accuracy of the information, to all authors for review. The external authors provided several comments and identified additional analysis for the paper. These were provided by GSK. The revised draft developed by STI was sent to all authors for review and comment. Additional comments were provided and incorporated by STI. After several additional drafts, the manuscript was submitted to the journal.
The journal also provided numerous comments on the paper and these were addressed by the authors in conjunction with STI. After a period of approximately 3 years that paper was finally accepted for publication.
The Journal is satisfied that the named contributors of this article satisfy the criteria for authorship as set forth in the “Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals” from the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors but that Journal policy was not followed in that there were contributions by unnamed writers to the preparation of a paper.
The editorial contributions of STI should have been acknowledged in the published article as required at the time the article was published. This note outlining STI’s involvement will appear in MEDLINE and other databases as a Comment on the paper.
Robert Freedman, M.D., Editor-in-Chief
Michael D. Roy, Executive Editor
