Center for Perioperative Optimization, Department of Surgery, Herlev and Gentofte Hospitals, University of Copenhagen, Herlev, Denmark.
Curr Med Res Opin. 2021 Jun;37(6):985-993. doi: 10.1080/03007995.2021.1905622. Epub 2021 Apr 6.
Fast dissemination of research is important for improving treatments and thus benefitting patients, caregivers, and researchers. However, getting scientific papers published may take a long time. The editorial handling time can be delayed by several processes both before and after acceptance of the paper. The aim of this study was to systematically review the editorial handling time of biomedical peer-reviewed literature (i.e. time from submission to publication).
The protocol for this systematic review was registered in PROSPERO (CRD42020196238). PubMed and EMBASE were searched systematically on 29 May 2020. We included publications on the timespan between submission and publication for accepted articles published in biomedical journals.
Of the 4197 unique studies identified in the search, 69 were included in the systematic review. The mean timespan from submission to publication varied from 91 to 639 days, while the median timespan varied from 70 to 558 days. Submission to acceptance and acceptance to publication timespans showed similar disparity with means ranging from 50 to 276 and 11 to 362 days, respectively. Data were too statistically heterogeneous to perform meta-analyses.
Editorial handling times of journals varied widely from a few months to almost two years, which delays the availability of new evidence. The editorial handling time did not differ between submission-to-acceptance-time and acceptance-to-publication-time. Examining differences in editorial processes between journals with long and short editorial handling times may help uncover, which processes are frequent causes of delay and thereby where to improve.
研究的快速传播对于改善治疗方法从而使患者、护理人员和研究人员受益非常重要。然而，将科学论文发表可能需要很长时间。在论文被接受之前和之后，有几个过程会延迟编辑处理时间。本研究的目的是系统地回顾生物医学同行评议文献的编辑处理时间（即从提交到发表的时间）。
本系统评价的方案已在 PROSPERO（CRD42020196238）中注册。我们于 2020 年 5 月 29 日在 PubMed 和 EMBASE 上进行了系统搜索。我们纳入了发表在生物医学期刊上的已接受文章的投稿到发表时间的出版物。
在搜索中确定的 4197 篇独特研究中，有 69 篇被纳入系统评价。从提交到发表的平均时间间隔从 91 天到 639 天不等，中位数时间间隔从 70 天到 558 天不等。从提交到接受和从接受到发表的时间间隔也存在类似的差异，平均值分别为 50 天至 276 天和 11 天至 362 天。数据的统计学异质性太大，无法进行荟萃分析。
期刊的编辑处理时间差异很大，从几个月到近两年不等，这延迟了新证据的可用性。从提交到接受时间和从接受到发表时间的编辑处理时间没有差异。检查编辑处理时间长和短的期刊之间的编辑流程差异，可能有助于发现哪些流程是延迟的常见原因，从而在哪些方面进行改进。
