Following on from a statement issued by OASPA http://oaspa.org/blog/. Sage has released the following statement.
We welcome OASPA’s investigation into the quality of research published by its members and will fully cooperate with the 6-month review. We have already taken steps to ensure that the peer review process of the Journal of International Medical Research is much more robust and are confident that OASPA will find our processes more than sufficiently strengthened when they undertake the review. Any paper with similar flaws would not get through either stage of the peer review process of JIMR today.
JIMR did not accept the article for publication as it stands. It was accepted subject to further editorial queries being answered to the satisfaction of the journal.
JIMR operates a two-stage review process, specific to this journal. First, the editor performs an initial review of a submission and then, once a paper has passed this initial review stage, it is accepted subject to a detailed technical edit, which is undertaken by at least two experienced medical technical editors. It is not uncommon for articles to be rejected at this technical stage.
While we are confident that the technical edit would have revealed the errors, we are extremely concerned that a paper with fundamental errors got through the initial stage and, as discussed with and acknowledged by OASPA, have taken steps to ensure that it cannot occur again.
JIMR is a long-established, respected journal that has been publishing quality research for 41 years. It is JCR-listed, and its rejection rate was 62.5% in 2012. JIMR operates with complete editorial independence and the Editor has no financial incentive to accept papers. Professor Malcolm Lader Ph.D., M.D., F.R.C. Psych., F. Med. Sci., Emeritus Professor, King’s College London is the Editor of the journal and has been for the last 25 years. The journal has a world class Editorial Board.
SAGE is committed to ensuring that the peer review and acceptance process for all of our journals, whether traditional subscription-based or open access, is robust and to working with OASPA to ensure this. We are pleased that OASPA has recognized our efforts and that they will allow us to formally remain a member of the organization while our official status is put under review.
