Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology and the Center for Bioethics and Medical Humanities, Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Obstet Gynecol. 2019 Jun;133(6):1081-1083. doi: 10.1097/AOG.0000000000003260.
Peer review is the major method used by the scientific community to evaluate manuscripts and decide what is suitable for publication. However, this process in its current design is not bulletproof and is prone to reviewer and editorial bias. Its lack of objectivity and transparency raise concerns that manuscripts might be judged based on interests irrelevant to the content itself and not on merit alone. This commentary reviews some of the most common biases that could potentially affect objective evaluation of a manuscript and proposes alternatives to the current single-blind peer review process that is being used by most scientific journals, including Obstetrics & Gynecology. By rethinking and tackling the shortcomings of the current methodology for peer review, we hope to create a discussion that will eventually lead to improving research and, ultimately, patient care.
同行评议是科学界评估稿件并决定哪些稿件适合发表的主要方法。然而，目前的设计存在缺陷，容易受到评审员和编辑的偏见影响。它缺乏客观性和透明度，让人担心稿件可能会根据与内容本身无关的利益进行评判，而不是仅凭优点进行评判。本文评论了一些可能会影响稿件客观评价的常见偏见，并提出了一些替代目前大多数科学期刊使用的单盲同行评议过程的方法，包括《妇产科》。通过重新思考和解决同行评议当前方法学的缺点，我们希望能够引发一场讨论，最终提高研究水平，并最终改善患者的护理。
