{"id":28663,"date":"2012-04-30T15:36:44","date_gmt":"2012-04-30T19:36:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/?post_type=news&#038;p=28663"},"modified":"2012-04-30T15:36:44","modified_gmt":"2012-04-30T19:36:44","slug":"heartrhythm-editor-douglas-zipes-defends-peer-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/2012\/04\/30\/heartrhythm-editor-douglas-zipes-defends-peer-review\/","title":{"rendered":"HeartRhythm Editor Douglas Zipes Defends Peer Review"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Rejecting an extraordinary request from industry to retract a controversial paper, Douglas Zipes, the editor-in-chief of\u00a0Heart<em>Rhythm,<\/em>\u00a0has written\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.heartrhythmjournal.com\/webfiles\/images\/journals\/hrthm\/Dr.Zipes.pdf\">a rare, highly pointed editorial<\/a>\u00a0defending the publication process.\u00a0&#8220;If one disagrees with facts\/statements in a publication,&#8221; \u00a0writes Zipes, &#8220;there is a well-defined approach that can begin with a letter to the editor or submission of one\u2019s own data for peer review to counter the conclusions in the article.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Zipes was responding to\u00a0a request from St. Jude\u00a0alleging numerous mistakes and oversights in\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.heartrhythmjournal.com\/article\/S1547-5271(12)00291-3\/abstract\">an article by Robert Hauser published online i<\/a><a href=\"http:\/\/www.heartrhythmjournal.com\/article\/S1547-5271(12)00291-3\/abstract\">n Heart<\/a><em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.heartrhythmjournal.com\/article\/S1547-5271(12)00291-3\/abstract\">Rhythm<\/a>\u00a0<\/em>linking the company\u2019s Riata and Riata ST leads to 20 or more deaths.\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/investors.sjm.com\/phoenix.zhtml?c=73836&amp;p=irol-newsArticle&amp;ID=1680886\">The company publicly asked the journal<\/a>, which is published by the Heart Rhythm Society, to retract the article.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The peer review process is a time-honored, well-choreographed procedure that has served the intellectual world for several hundred years,&#8221; writes Zipes. &#8220;While occasional decisions may be incorrect, and fail to identify a submission of low (or high) quality, containing incorrect data, or even one that is fraudulent, in the main the system works.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The publication of an editorial by Zipes was itself unusual, he noted:\u00a0&#8220;I do not write many editorials because I feel my role as editor-in-chief is to be as impartial as possible.&#8221; In this case, &#8220;however, the recent events that transpired&#8230;have compelled me to speak out.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The Hauser article has received additional public support from\u00a0electrophysiologist Edward J Schloss. In<a href=\"http:\/\/cardiobrief.org\/2012\/04\/13\/guest-post-after-an-unprecedented-request-for-a-retraction-a-close-look-at-the-data\/\">\u00a0a detailed review of the Hauser and St. Jude papers<\/a>, Schloss noted that they \u00a0had applied different methodologies in their search of the MAUDE database.<\/p>\n<p>Schloss offered the following comment in response to the Zipes editorial: &#8220;I applaud Dr. Zipes and\u00a0Heart<em>Rhythm<\/em>\u00a0for publishing Dr. Hauser&#8217;s study. \u00a0This important work should serve as a call to the cardiology community to increase their vigilance in detecting electrical failures in Riata\/Riata ST ICD leads.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Rejecting an extraordinary request from industry to retract a controversial paper, Douglas Zipes, the editor-in-chief of\u00a0HeartRhythm,\u00a0has written\u00a0a rare, highly pointed editorial\u00a0defending the publication process.\u00a0&#8220;If one disagrees with facts\/statements in a publication,&#8221; \u00a0writes Zipes, &#8220;there is a well-defined approach that can begin with a letter to the editor or submission of one\u2019s own data for peer [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":196,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[1243,1244,975,1242,1209],"class_list":["post-28663","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-electrophysiology","tag-douglas-zipes","tag-heartrhythm","tag-riata","tag-robert-hauser","tag-st-jude-medical"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28663","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/196"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28663"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28663\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28663"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28663"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28663"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}