PubMed should raise the bar for journal inclusion

A survey by Manca and colleagues1Manca A Martinez G Cugusi L Dragone D Mercuro G Deriu F Predatory open access in rehabilitation.Arch Phys Med Rehabil. 2017; 98: 1051-1056Summary Full Text Full Text PDF PubMed Scopus (55) Google Scholar, 2Manca A Martinez G Cugusi L Dragone D Dvir Z Deriu F The surge of predatory open-access in neurosciences and neurology.Neuroscience. 2017; 20: 166-173Crossref Scopus (63) Google Scholar found that predatory journals active in neuroscience and neurology outnumber those regularly indexed in the main biomedical databases. Furthermore, this analysis of predatory publishing (as of October, 2016) showed that over 10% of predatory journals in three important subdisciplines are indexed in PubMed (12% for rehabilitation, 11·4% for neurosciences, and 20·2% for neurology).1Manca A Martinez G Cugusi L Dragone D Mercuro G Deriu F Predatory open access in rehabilitation.Arch Phys Med Rehabil. 2017; 98: 1051-1056Summary Full Text Full Text PDF PubMed Scopus (55) Google Scholar, 2Manca A Martinez G Cugusi L Dragone D Dvir Z Deriu F The surge of predatory open-access in neurosciences and neurology.Neuroscience. 2017; 20: 166-173Crossref Scopus (63) Google Scholar By April, 2017, these values increased to 23·7% for rehabilitation, 16·1% for neuroscience, and 24·7% for neurology, indicating that this practice is ceaseless and evolves rapidly. Curiously, over the same 6-month period, the number of articles retrievable in PubMed that oppose predatory publishing has grown by 46·5%, from 86 to 126, but this increase has not prevented predatory journals from continuing undisturbed. Needless to say, PubMed is one of the world's leading medical resources; it handles millions of queries daily and is an essential tool for health researchers worldwide.3Bengt E McDougall A Pubmed essentials, mastering the world's health research database. 3rd edn. Form & Kunskap AB, Stallarholmen2014Google Scholar Since its introduction, its effect on public health has been incalculable. Therefore, it is worrisome that PubMed includes journals with seriously flawed peer review processes. This issue deserves attention as these predatory journals can benefit from PubMed's massive popularity and achieve universal exposure while their largely low-quality articles can be cited in reputable journals, thus obtaining legitimacy and polluting scientific records. This matter is particularly alarming because clinical practice heavily depends on findings generated by peer-reviewed articles. Furthermore, although the National Library of Medicine refers to these journals under the descriptor “Not currently indexed for MEDLINE”, citations for author manuscripts are labelled as “included”. Thus, highly regarded databases like PubMed and PubMed Central should raise the bar for journal acceptance,4Beall J Predatory journals: ban predators from the scientific record.Nature. 2016; 16: 326Crossref Scopus (80) Google Scholar and join the Directory of Open Access Journals, Scopus, and MEDLINE in imposing stringent criteria for inclusion of journals and publishers. We declare no competing interests. AM and FD conceived the idea and drafted the manuscript. LC conceived the idea and was responsible for the final revision; ZD provided editorial advice and guidance, and was responsible for the final revision.