Frequently Asked Questions About PLoS and PLoS Medicine
Open access and medical research
What is open-access publishing?
The Public Library of Science (PLoS) applies the Creative Commons Attribution License (CCAL) to all works we publish. Under the CCAL, authors retain ownership of the copyright for their article, but authors allow anyone to download, reuse, reprint, modify, distribute, and/or copy articles in PLoS journals, so long as the original authors and source are cited. No permission is required from the authors or the publishers.
Open access makes papers more useful by allowing sophisticated searching, manipulation, and mining of the literature.
Why is open access important for medical research?
Published discoveries and ideas are the foundation for future progress in medicine and healthcare. The more widely and freely accessible they are, the greater their value to researchers, clinicians, policymakers, and the public. Unfettered access to this research literature will facilitate basic and clinical research throughout the world, and hasten the development of new treatments for those most in need.
How will open access publishing affect the practice of medical science?
According to the World Health Organization, only 10% of health research funding targets the diseases and conditions that account for 90% of global health problems. Even worse, the research results that do address these problems remain inaccessible to the great majority of health care providers who need it most. Open access publishing strives to correct this fundamental inequity by making medical research a global public resource, and by delivering critical information such that it may be easily condensed, summarized, and reproduced to support local health care efforts around the world. Closing the information gap between rich and poor nations provides a necessary first step towards promoting universal, evidence-based health care, while at the same time promoting scientific inquiry through the untrammeled exchange of ideas.
Why do we need open access when other journals release their content within a year after publication?
Not many journals release their content for free, and those that do maintain restrictions on how that free content may be used and distributed by readers. Furthermore, the delay they impose—often 6 or 12 months—can be problematic for both authors and readers of medical research. Open-access publishing offers a meaningful alternative: immediate access to the latest research, free of charge and with few limits on how the material is reused. We believe that medical research can and should be disseminated as efficiently, effectively, and equitably as possible.
Do authors have to assign copyright to PLoS?
No. It will be up to the authors to decide whether they wish to retain copyright or transfer copyright to their research institution or to PLoS. But no matter who owns the copyright, authors will be required to grant users an irrevocable license to print, copy, or use the work in any lawful way, subject to the condition that proper attribution is given whenever the work is reproduced or redistributed. Please see our licensing agreement for more information and this editorial for a further explanation of why we employ this copyright arrangement.
Why should I have to pay to publish my paper?
It costs money to produce a peer-reviewed, edited, and formatted article for online publication, and to host it on a server that's accessible around the clock. This cost is small relative to the funding for the research project as a whole (usually around 1%), but it serves the crucial final step of disseminating a completed body of work to the scientific community. In many cases, authors already pay for publication in the form of page or color charges; we ask them, their institution, or their funding agency for a flat fee of US$2750 to help cover the entire editorial and production process. Several major private funding sources have explicitly endorsed the open access model for publishing. For example, the largest private funding source for medical research in the U.S., Howard Hughes Medical Institute, has committed to supplementing its grants with additional money to cover publication in open-access journals such as PLoS Medicine. In the UK the Wellcome Trust also pays the costs of publication in open access journals. Your institution may have already agreed to cover all or part of the publication charge in which case when you submit your article, this information will be listed on the submission page (see the list of institutional members).
What if I can't afford the publication charges?
We will waive the charges, with no further questions asked. The editors and reviewers have no knowledge of your ability to pay, so it can never be a factor in editorial decisions.
Inside PLoS Medicine
What areas of original research are covered in PLoS Medicine?
The journal publishes human studies in all medical fields, from basic studies to large scale clinical research, including epidemiology and public health. We publish occasional studies in animal models when they report outstanding research findings that are highly clinically relevant. See our editorial for more information on such studies.
How is PLoS Medicine different from other high-profile, medical journals?
By offering free access and redistribution rights for all our articles, PLoS Medicine aims to bring the latest medical research to a global audience. Our unique and rigorous review process is run as a collaborative effort between an international team of academic editors, who are experts in their field, and experienced, full-time professional editors working to ensure fairness and consistency. The journal is international and inclusive, covering global health issues, neglected diseases, health policy, and vital debates in medicine, with easy-to-read, professionally written summaries provided for each research article. Finally, unlike most other medical journals, PLoS Medicine will not carry advertisements for drugs or other medical devices.
Who should read PLoS Medicine?
Clinical researchers, practicing health care providers, policy-makers, medical educators, and medical students, as well as patients, their families, and their friends, will all benefit in different ways from reading PLoS Medicine.
Why should clinical researchers read PLoS Medicine?
As a top-tier medical journal, PLoS Medicine publishes high quality research papers across all medical fields, including global health and epidemiology. The journal is run by a team of experienced editors who have previously worked in medical publishing, including at major medical journals such as the Lancet, the British Medical Journal, and the Journal of Clinical Investigation. The peer review process is run in collaboration with academic researchers thus ensuring the quality of published articles. As an open access journal, clinical researchers do not have to depend on their institutions having a subscription in order to read important research papers.
Why should practicing health care providers read PLoS Medicine?
PLoS Medicine emphasizes both original research and the application of that research to clinical practice. The Perspectives section will describe wider implications of an important research study, The Learning Forum sections uses specific clinical cases to educate health care providers about specific clinical issues. The journal publishes original research in all medical fields—including those most important to health care providers around the world—and also provides summaries for non experts written by the editorial staff.
Why should health policy-makers read PLoS Medicine?
As one of the only major medical publications to provide immediate, free access to all its content, PLoS Medicine has a particular role in the dissemination of the policy and practice of health care around the world. Any policymaker with Internet access can download and distribute an article without any restrictions (all we ask is that articles are cited correctly). Original research is supported by plain language summaries, and perspective articles that discuss the wider relevance of these findings. Sections in the magazine section of the journal will highlight the efforts of policy-makers to improve clinical care for their constituencies, and offer a wealth of essays and ideas for how research may be translated into public health.
Why should medical educators read PLoS Medicine?
PLoS Medicine has a strong focus on global issues relevant to educating future doctors, nurses, and other healthcare providers about the latest advances in medical research. Medical educators can find valuable primary materials and thoughtful discussion pieces that can be freely reproduced and distributed in an educational (or any other) setting, according to the terms of our open-access license.
Why should medical students read PLoS Medicine?
PLoS Medicine brings the best medical research in all disciplines to medical students throughout the world, and explain what it means for professionals and patients. Students can find a unique, global perspective on current medical debates, and analyses of vital health issues, including social medicine, neglected diseases, and key controversies. PLoS Medicine helps students keep up to date with important areas of research, policy, and practice, and gain a broader understanding of health care. The learning forum section provides case-based learning materials; an online quiz in each issue helps students to test their knowledge of a specific clinical area. We also publish a section written by students—student forum. The journal will actively engage medical students from all over the world without subjecting them to drug advertising or other unnecessary marketing.
Why should patients, their families, and their friends read PLoS Medicine?
According to the Pew Foundation, in the United States alone every year more than 100 million people go on-line in search of medical information. PLoS Medicine provides a new opportunity for these patients, their families, and their friends to be fully-informed about the latest medical research and how it relates to them. By offering top-quality, peer-reviewed clinical research free to the public, PLoS Medicine invites non-specialists to join the medical community in learning about important clinical issues. Because every research article is published with a clear and accessible summary written for a general audience, the journal ensures that a public audience can understand how medical research affects their lives.
What is in the magazine section of PLoS Medicine?
In addition to publishing original research articles, PLoS Medicine has a lively and provocative Magazine Section that fosters discussion, debate, and analysis of important issues in health and medical research. The section is global in outlook, with an international authorship, and includes the following features:
- The Editorial is written by the PLoS Medicine editors
- The PLoS Medicine Debate covers important but controversial issues in health policy and practice.
- Neglected Diseases highlights a particular issue in health care.
- Health in Action provides a venue for advocacy groups, healthcare workers, and NGOs to discuss their novel approaches to delivering health care.
- Policy Forum offers policy makers the chance to debate the challenges and opportunities for improving health care to their constituencies.
- Essays are opinion pieces on topics of broad interest to a general medical audience.
- The Perspectives section gives an expert the chance to discuss the clinical practice or public health implications of a freely-available, published study.
- Research in Translation discusses a particular drug, treatment, or intervention in the context of translation from early to clinical research or clinical evidence to practice.
- Learning Forum uses a clinical case as the motivator for teaching a general medical audience about an important clinical problem.
- The Student Forum essays give a medical student perspective on any topic related to medicine, health, or medical education.
How does PLoS Medicine serve those in developing nations?
As an open-access, community medical journal with a strong focus on global health, PLoS Medicine provides a new resource for health care providers in developing nations. Our open-access license will allows policy makers to reproduce and redistribute the journal as they see fit, maximizing its local impact through creative reuse, and providing crucial information to practitioners on the front lines. A local official could conceivably print a copy of an important article for every single health professional in the country without special permission. Furthermore, many of the articles, features, forums, and debates we publish address the most pressing health problems in developing nations.
How can I support PLoS and PLoS Medicine?
We encourage scientists and physicians to consider submitting to PLoS Medicine manuscripts of the highest possible quality-either research papers or articles for the Magazine section of the journal. In addition to submitting your best work, we need advocates within the community: tell your colleagues about PLoS Medicine; if you hear from colleagues about a great piece of research, suggest that they submit it to PLoS for publication; sign up to receive alerts and updates from our organization; if you are a member of a society, consider whether your society's journals would better serve the community if they were open access. Above all else, PLoS is a community initiative, so if you have thoughts about how we're doing, or if there's a new project you think we should be working on, please let us know.
Publishing your paper in PLoS Medicine
How do papers get reviewed at PLoS Medicine?
We involve the academic community in our peer review process as much as possible. After professional staff have determined that the paper falls within the scope of the journal, and is of a minimum acceptable quality, decisions on whether to send a paper out for in-depth review are made via a collaboration between experienced, professional editors who work full time at PLoS, and academic editors who are experts in their field. In this system, all papers within the scope of the journal—even those rejected without peer review—receive ample consideration. The academic editors remain involved at all levels of the review process, through the oversight of revisions to the final acceptance of a paper.
What are the turnaround times for submissions to the journal?
A preliminary decision on whether to send a submitted manuscript for full peer review can be expected in about 1-2 weeks, and the initial results of an in-depth review within 4-6 weeks. Since we are not constrained by page budgets, papers are published around 6-8 weeks from the date of final acceptance, or according to an expedited schedule when necessary. All phases of the process can be tracked via the web.
What is your impact factor?
PLoS Medicine’s 2006 impact factor is 13.8. However, the impact factor measured by Thomson Scientific provides just one measure of how often a journal’s papers have been cited in that year. For a wider discussion of impact factors, see the June 2006 Editorial. There are a number of ways of measuring a journal’s impact, including the influence it has on health policy, how widely read its papers are, and how frequently the papers are cited by other researchers.
Will all PLoS articles be published in English?
Our journals are published in English, but in the future we would like to be able to make our publications available in multiple languages. As a first step, we encourage authors to submit translations of their abstracts or even whole articles; these are published as supplementary information. Our license agreement, the Creative Commons Attribution License, also allows anyone to make and distribute translations, as long as they give credit to the original authors.
How will PLoS Medicine articles be archived, and how safe are they?
PLoS Medicine articles are made freely available at our website as soon as they are published, and also deposited in PubMed Central. We are also working with various partners to establish similar archives around the world. In addition, our licensing agreement allows any third party—librarian, institution, or individual—to establish their own archive of PLoS articles. The long-term safety of any article depends on the ease with which it can be copied and redistributed in multiple locations, and open-access publishing ensures that archiving will be as simple and secure as possible.
What is the journal's position on competing interests?
Competing interests are a factor in the consideration of a submitted manuscript. All authors are contacted via e-mail during the submission process and asked to declare whether they have any financial, personal, or professional interests that could be construed to have influenced the reporting of the experimental data or conclusions in their paper. See our policy for more general information on the policy of the Public Library of Science towards competing interests. Reviewers are also asked to declare any interests that might interfere with their objective assessment of a manuscript. Any relevant competing interests will be stated in the published article.