In Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics Article, Attorneys Discuss Maintaining Integrity of Biomedical Research Record Through Timely Appropriate Corrective Action

In a Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics article, health care and higher education attorneys Minal Caron, Carolyn Lye, and Mark Barnes discuss maintaining the integrity of the biomedical research record through timely and appropriate corrective action.

The authors explain that to preserve the integrity of the biomedical research record and protect patient and research participant safety, research institutions and scholarly journals need an efficient and uniform approach to correcting and, when necessary, retracting published research. 

The authors examine the prevalence and latency of journal corrective action and offer recommendations to editors of biomedical research journals and administrators of academic institutions for when and how to take corrective action when inaccurate or unreliable data have been identified in published research.

The article was co-authored by attorney Lauren Walsh of Mass General Brigham and Harvard Medical School Center for Bioethics and Professor Barbara Bierer of Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital.