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Improving the peer review skills of young rheumatologists and researchers in rheumatology: the EMEUNET Peer Review Mentoring Program
  1. Javier Rodríguez-Carrio1,2,
  2. Polina Putrik3,
  3. Alexandre Sepriano4,5,
  4. Anna Moltó6,7,
  5. Elena Nikiphorou8,9,
  6. Laure Gossec10,11,
  7. Tore K Kvien12 and
  8. Sofia Ramiro4
  9. on behalf of the EMEUNET Working Group
  1. 1Area of Immunology, Department of Functional Biology, Universidad de Oviedo, Oviedo, Spain
  2. 2Instituto de Investigación Sanitaria del Principado de Asturias (ISPA), Asturias, Spain
  3. 3Department of Rheumatology, Maastricht University Medical Center, Maastricht, The Netherlands
  4. 4Department of Rheumatology, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, The Netherlands
  5. 5CEDOC, NOVA Medical School, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal
  6. 6Rheumatology Department, Cochin Hospital, Assistance Publique-Hôpitaux de Paris, Paris Descartes University, Paris, France
  7. 7INSERM (U1153), Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, PRES Sorbonne Paris-Cité, Paris, France
  8. 8Academic Rheumatology Department, King’s College London, London, UK
  9. 9Rheumatology Department, Whittington Hospital, London, UK
  10. 10Institut Pierre Louis d’Epidémiologie et de Santé Publique, GRC-UPMC 08, Sorbonne Universités, UPMC University, Paris, France
  11. 11Rheumatology Department, AP–HP, Pitié-Salpetrière Hospital, Paris, France
  12. 12Department of Rheumatology, Diakonhjemmet Hospital, Oslo, Norway
  1. Correspondence to Dr Javier Rodríguez-Carrio; javiercarrio{at}hotmail.com

Abstract

Although peer review plays a central role in the maintenance of high standards in scientific research, training of reviewing skills is not included in the common education programmes. The Emerging EULAR (European League Against Rheumatism) Network (EMEUNET) developed a programme to address this unmet need. The EMEUNET Peer Review Mentoring Program for Rheumatology Journals promotes a systematic training of reviewing skills by engaging mentees in a ‘real world’ peer review experience supervised by experienced mentors with support from rheumatology journals. This viewpoint provides an overview of this initiative and its outcomes, and discusses its potential limitations. Over 4 years, 18 mentors and 86 mentees have participated. Among the 33 participants who have completed the programme, 13 (39.3%) have become independent reviewers for Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases after the training. This programme has been recently evaluated by a survey and qualitative interviews, revealing a high interest in this initiative. The main strengths (involvement of a top journal and learning opportunities) and weaknesses of the programme (limited number of places and insufficient dissemination) were identified. Overall, this programme represents an innovative and successful approach to peer review training. Continuous evaluation and improvement are key to its functioning. The EMEUNET Peer Review Mentoring Program may be used as a reference for peer review training in areas outside rheumatology.

  • rheumatoid arthritis
  • disease activity
  • treatment

This is an Open Access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

https://doi.org/10.1136/rmdopen-2017-000619

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    Footnotes

    • Contributors JR-C, PP, AS, EN, AM, LG, TKV and SR contributed to the design of the study, collection of the data, interpretation of the results and writing of the manuscript.

    • Funding JR-C is supported by a postdoctoral fellowship (’Juan de la Cierva' programme, reference FJCI-2015-23849) from MINECO (Spain). AS is supported by a doctoral grant from ’Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia' (grant number: SFRH/BD/108246/2015).

    • Competing interests TKK was Editor-in-Chief of the Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases from 2008 to 2017.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

    • Data sharing statement Survey content and interview guide are available upon request to the authors.