Bias in research

By writing scientific articles we communicate science among colleagues and peers. By doing this, it is our responsibility to adhere to some basic principles like transparency and accuracy. Authors, journal editors and reviewers need to be concerned about the quality of the work submitted for publication and ensure that only studies which have been designed, conducted and reported in a transparent way, honestly and without any deviation from the truth get to be published. Any such trend or deviation from the truth in data collection, analysis, interpretation and publication is called bias. Bias in research can occur either intentionally or unintentionally. Bias causes false conclusions and is potentially misleading. Therefore, it is immoral and unethical to conduct biased research. Every scientist should thus be aware of all potential sources of bias and undertake all possible actions to reduce or minimize the deviation from the truth. This article describes some basic issues related to bias in research

News at Biochemia Medica: Research integrity corner, updated Guidelines to authors, revised Author statement form and adopted ICMJE Conflict-of-interest form

From the issue 23(1) we have implemented several major changes in the editorial policies and procedures. We hope that those changes will raise awareness of our potential authors and reviewers for research and publication integrity issues as well as to improve the quality of our submissions and published articles. Among those changes is the launch of a special journal section called Research Integrity Corner. In this section we aim to publish educational articles dealing with different research and publication misconduct issues. Moreover, we have done a comprehensive revision of our Instructions to authors. Whereas our former Instructions to authors have mostly been concerned with recommendations for manuscript preparation and submission, the revised document additionally describes the editorial procedure for all submitted articles and provides exact journal policies towards research integrity, authorship, copyright and conflict of interest. By putting these Guidelines into action, we hope that our main ethical policies and requirements are now visible and available to all our potential authors. We have also revised the former Authorship and copyright form which is now called the Author statement form. This form now contains statements on the authorship, originality of work, research ethics, patient privacy and confidentiality, and copyright transfer. Finally, Journal has adopted the ICMJE Form for Disclosure of Potential Conflicts of Interest. From this issue, for each submitted article, authors are requested to fill out the “ICMJE Form for Disclosure of Potential Conflicts of Interest” as well as the Author statement form and upload those forms during the online manuscript submission process. We honestly believe that our authors and readers will appreciate such endeavors. In this Editorial article we briefly explain the background and the nature of those recent major editorial changes

Biochemia Medica introduces the revised policy on Statement of Conflict of Interest

Biochemia Medica announces that from this issue Journal will be publishing the Statement on Conflict of Interest for Authors for all article types in printed as well as in electronic form of the Journal. This way Journal wishes to provide its readers the opportunity to unambiguously judge the quality and reliability of the data presentation and potential competing interests that could have biased the quality of the presented work in any way. This decision was made because we believe that scientific journals have an ultimate responsibility to provide unbiased scientific articles to its readership. We also believe that if any potential source of bias exists, it is the responsibility of the journal to disclose this informati-on, since this might influence the judging the manuscript by editors, reviewers and readers. Therefore, when submitting their work in the future, author are kindly invited to make sure that they have carefully considered and disclosed all potential sources of competing interests that might have influ-enced their work. We hope that in such way we can help build a better future for the evidence based scientific research, on an international level

Education in clinical chemistry and laboratory medicine in various European countries

Understanding the complexity and heterogeneity of the educational systems, across Europe, aids in the identification of new initiatives in defining the core competences and skills necessary to practice the profession. Basic education of those who practice laboratory medicine, in European countries, may be in medicine, pharmacy, biochemistry or science. Their postgraduate education may last quite a variable time: from several months to several years, depending on the country. Some countries have established official registers and licensing system, whereas others may still not have that. In some countries profession is regulated by law, whereas in others that is not the case. Harmonization and common regulation of the undergraduate and postgraduate education and vocational training programs in clinical chemistry and laboratory medicine in various EU countries has therefore become the top priority within the European community. In this themed issue we deliver a series of articles describing the way professionals practicing laboratory medicine are educated and trained in several European countries: Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Hungary, Lithuania, Ukraine and Greece. I wish to thank to all authors for their valuable contribution. I hope that readers will appreciate their efforts and read this special issue with great interest

MEDLINE® Indexing of the Sultan Qaboos University Medical Journal : A great leap forward for biomedical research and publishing in the Gulf region

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Biochemia Medica indexed in Medline

Biochemia Medica has been approved for inclusion in PubMed/Medline bibliographic database, from the first issue published in 2011 year. We believe that this outstanding achievement comes as acknowledgment for many past efforts and some recent developments of the journal Editorial Board, such as recent launch of a new web page, online manuscript submission system and the implementa-tion of the revised policy on the Statement of Conflict of Interest. We will continue our committed work to maintain the timeliness of publication, publication ethics and research integrity, and further improve the quality of content as well as the quality of the editorial work and production of the Journal. We sincerely hope that inclusion of our Journal in PubMed will enable us to increase its international visibility and the number of high-quality submissions

Biochemia Medica indexed in PubMed Central (PMC)

As announced in the last journal issue (1), with great pleasure we wish to inform you that Biochemia Medica has just been accepted for indexing in PubMed Central (PMC) journal database (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/). All articles starting from 2012;22(3) are now available as free PMC articles and can be accessed directly at PMC. Free full PMC articles can also be accessed through link from PubMed. The first ever Croatian journal accepted for indexing in PubMed Central was Croatian Medical Journal. Biochemia Medica is the second journal from Croatia that appears in PMC. It is a dream for many society journal editors. This is certainly an important milestone in our pursuit to join the competitive world of the mainstream science biomedical journals. We hope that through PMC, our journal will become more visible and accessible to much wider research community. PMC is a free full-text archive of biomedical and life sciences journal literature at the U.S. National Institutes of Health’s National Library of Medicine (NIH/NLM). Currently, almost 3 million articles are archived in PMC, provided by more than 4,000 Journals. We are proud to be one of them! Such recognition is a result of a hard work of our editorial team who is determined to maintain and continuously improve the journal quality, by adhering to highest quality standards (2). Editors at Biochemia Medica wish to thank to all our authors and reviewers for their continuous contribution to the success of our journal. We also wish to thank to our readers for their valuable feedback