F1000Res. 2015 Jul 29;4:419. doi: 10.12688/f1000research.6809.1. eCollection 2015.
- 1Department of Legal Medicine and Forensic Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
; IINFACTS - Institute of Research and Advanced Training in Health
Sciences and Technologies, Department of Sciences, Advanced Institute of
Health Sciences - North (ISCS-N), CESPU, CRL, Gandra, Portugal
; UCIBIO-REQUIMTE, Laboratory of Toxicology, Department of Biological
Sciences, Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal.
- 2Department of Legal Medicine and Forensic Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal.
Abstract
In recent years, there has been a significant increase in the number of scientific publications- it is the era of "hunting
the article". This commentary discusses the drawbacks of the pressure
to publish that certainly contribute to the 'dark side' of science. In
fact, health science career progression greatly relies on the number of
scientific publications a researcher has, and in many cases these may be
more valorized than the health services provided. Of course, scientific
publications help to develop the skills of health care professionals,
but as Einstein highlighted " not everything that counts can be counted,
and not everything that can be counted counts".
KEYWORDS:
fraud; impact factor; open access and traditional journals; peer-review; pressure for publication
