Comment: blind peer review of journal articles.

TOTHE EDITOR:I was surprised by the results of the study by Cleary and Alexander (DICP 1988;22:601-2) which found that less than 20 percent of the medical journals surveyed do not blind reviewers to the source of manuscripts submitted for publication. I admire the integrity of the publisher for choosing to print a paper on this delicate subject. This study raises several issues important to pharmacists. As clinical pharmacy matures as an academic pursuit, increasing pressure is placed on faculty to publish. Although there are several clinically oriented pharmacy journals, there are thousands of medical journals from which to choose when submitting research. Are those medical journals that do not blind reviewers less open (with or without intent) to publication by pharmacists? In their classic study, Peters and Ceci evaluated 12 psychology journals that used non blind review by resubmitting manuscripts that had previously been published in the same journal two years before, changing only the names of the authors and their institutions. Only 2 out of 16 reviewers felt that the previously published but unrecognized papers were suitable for publication.' Would the same thing have happened if medical journals were evaluated and the only alterations were in degree-from M.D. to Pharm.D.? A second concern is that perhaps some papers are published because of the reputation of the authors or institutions, that editors or reviewers let inferior papers "slide" if they are submitted from a prestigious researcher or institution. Despite what we would like to think, most health care professionals do not critically evaluate all published studies; we rely on the peer-review system to do that for us. Publication based on reputation rather than the attributes of the work presented is a disturbing thought. It seems to be a fairly easy and inexpensive task to remove the author identification page before sending a manuscript out for review. This measure does not guarantee anonymity, but it is a first step. Medical journals do not simply report on medical matters; their editorial decisions help shape the course of medicine. The process of publication is as important as the data published and this process should be made as objective as possible.