title: How psychiatry journals support the unbiased translation of clinical research. A cross-sectional study of editorial policies.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Reporting guidelines (e.g. CONSORT) have been developed as tools to improve quality and reduce bias in reporting research findings. Trial registration has been recommended for countering selective publication. The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) encourages the implementation of reporting guidelines and trial registration as uniform requirements (URM). For the last two decades, however, biased reporting and insufficient registration of clinical trials has been identified in several literature reviews and other investigations. No study has so far investigated the extent to which author instructions in psychiatry journals encourage following reporting guidelines and trial registration.
  
  
  METHODS
  Psychiatry Journals were identified from the 2011 Journal Citation Report. Information given in the author instructions and during the submission procedure of all journals was assessed on whether major reporting guidelines, trial registration and the ICMJE's URM in general were mentioned and adherence recommended.
  
  
  RESULTS
  We included 123 psychiatry journals (English and German language) in our analysis. A minority recommend or require 1) following the URM (21%), 2) adherence to reporting guidelines such as CONSORT, PRISMA, STROBE (23%, 7%, 4%), or 3) registration of clinical trials (34%). The subsample of the top-10 psychiatry journals (ranked by impact factor) provided much better but still improvable rates. For example, 70% of the top-10 psychiatry journals do not ask for the specific trial registration number.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Under the assumption that better reported and better registered clinical research that does not lack substantial information will improve the understanding, credibility, and unbiased translation of clinical research findings, several stakeholders including readers (physicians, patients), authors, reviewers, and editors might benefit from improved author instructions in psychiatry journals. A first step of improvement would consist in requiring adherence to the broadly accepted reporting guidelines and to trial registration.
authors.affiliation: Institute of History and Ethics in Medicine, Centre for Ethics and Law in the Life Sciences - CELLS, Hannover Medical School, Germany.
authors.forename: Hannes
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Knüppel
authors.forename: Courtney
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Metz
authors.forename: Joerg J
authors.initials: JJ
authors.lastname: Meerpohl
authors.forename: Daniel
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Strech
mesh_terms: D001319:Authorship; D002986:Clinical Trials as Topic; D035081:Editorial Policies; D006801:Humans; D055811:Journal Impact Factor; D017410:Practice Guidelines as Topic; D011570:Psychiatry; D017594:Publication Bias; D011643:Publishing / Q000941:ethics / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000592:standards* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D057170:Translational Research, Biomedical