Cureus publications? Worth it or just a waste of time

I think it's just a different way of publishing, but still valid

@ Andrew Paul McKenzie have you ever published with them?

It is very important to publish in a trusted and indexed journals under a well-know publisher.

Please see the link below.

@ Emad Kamil Hussein it is indexed in pubmed, but the articles i have seen published by cureus are mostly those that would not have been published by even any low impact factor journal. Mostly retrospective data or case reports! n each case report has "a rare" added to title!

Samia Husain, Cureus is an is an open access general medical journal known for its rather unusual crowdsourcing-type peer-review process. I'm not a medical researcher, but if I was, I would stay away from this journal. See also the following link:

Frank T. Edelmann that is exactly what i plan to do. The credibility is questionable but why is it even indexed in pubmed? polluting a reliable search engine!!!

Arvind Singh exactly!!!

There are bad comments on Cureus . The reviewing process in 3 days so there is no reviewing. Therefore, it is a waste of time

According to its founder, John Adler, MD, a Stanford professor of neurosurgery, emeritus;

An efficient peer review happens before an article is published and then there is a post publication scoring process. Every reader is invited to give a numerical score. However, someone who has deep domain knowledge as a specialist in a specific field gets more votes over a general practitioner. If an article is scored many dozens of times, then we get a very good measure of the article's quality. Ultimately, Cureus aspires to use the collective wisdom of all physicians.

I am not quite familiar with the Cureus Publication, but what I understand, they are the Journal of Medical Science, which is far from my profession. However, if in doubt, I think much better to publish to a trusted publisher.

The credibility of a journal may be assessed by examining several key factors:

Citation from the link cited below:

"The journal does not have a traditional impact factor; however, there is a system for peer scoring and tracking of page views (proxy measures of impact)."

Ronald Valledor Gomeseria so this basically means it scores 2/4. only plus is that it is pubmed indexed. no impact factor, questionable review.

Frank T. Edelmann thank you so much for clarifying it! hugely appreciated

Samia Husain you're very welcome. Try to beware of dubious journals wherever you can!

I have just submitted a paper to Cureus. The process is much more time consuming than submission to a regular journal as you essentially build the version of the manuscript that will potentially be published during the submission process. Having never used the system before it took 3 days for me to format the paper to their requirements. I confess that I checked and rechecked the submission requirements several times during this process. So next time it will be quicker.

I had to choose reviewers before submitting the manuscript. However, once I submitted the manuscript the editor assigned reviewed the submission, approved it and sent it out for review within hours.

The following day two reviews had been completed. Minor modifications were requested (which improved the quality of the work). I have edited the manuscript and resubmitted for editorial review.

I await their response. However whether it is accepted or not the whole process has been a breath of fresh air.

In the last 6 months I have been involved with a total of 64 submissions to journals from 11 ongoing projects. Of those 7 have been published, 6 have been accepted for publication and 14 are under peer review (including the Cureus paper).

Besides the paper submitted to Cureus I have no idea what is going on with the papers that are under review. However, Cureus provides clear data on how many reviewers have been asked and how many have accepted. I can see the reviews as soon as they are done.

Although I recognise that the Kudos of Cureus at present is significantly below that of a traditional journal, the concept and the process is certainly disruptive to the status quo of research publication.

Regardless of the outcome of this submission I will certainly submit work to Cureus again.

In my opinion, ease of submission does not equate to quality of journal..anyways congratulations on submitting your work and all the best for future publications.

I fully agree that ease of submission does not reflect quality. However I was highlighting that the speed of the process is like Warp 10 in comparison to the traditional model of research submission and publication. Furthermore the process is more transparent. It would certainly be ideal if the traditional models of could try to emulate Cureus in these respects.

What I really liked was that I could see the reviewers' comments immediately as they uploaded them and would get an email to say that a review had been completed. I could then start work to revised the manuscript and the respond immediately if necessary. I believe much of the process is automated by the Cureus' website once the editor and the authors submit their recommendations for reviewers so would not require much additional effort from the editors.

For example I initially submitted what I believe to be important work relevant to COVID-19 in mid July. I received reviewers comments in September. Responded and resubmitted within 7 days and am still awaiting the final editorial response in mid October. The peer-review processes involved are no more rigorous than those undertaken by Cureus but the time scale is substantially longer.

You are absolutely correct in saying so. The speed of publication and transparency are critical issues, most well reputed journals take eons to respond and at times they reject the submission after a year or so which is very disheartening and counterproductive to authors.

Dear Samia Husain thank you very much bringing up to this valid discussion whether Cureus is a good or bad journal or a predatory one. I will be commenting your question with my Editor in Chief, editorial board member for various medical journals and reviewers and a author hat.

According to my experience for that specific journal it’s a VERY credible author oriented / friendly journal.

I have published 3 original paper and one case report so far and I WILL continue to publish there in Cureus as it is fast and reliable reviewing process, no APC fee ( except preferred editing services with low payments). I will touch pros and cons below:

PROS:

1. ”Cureus“ is an PubMed indexed and Emerging Science Citation (ESCI) index journal. I disagree completely that it is a predatory or unreliable journal.

2. “Cureus” motto is “ peer reviewing isn’t not a peer Rejection “ as I completely agree.

3. Editors in chiefs are highly prestigious Professors, Professor John R.Adler from Stanford University is a genius professor who is widely credited with creating the field of image guided radiosurgery. Second Co-Chief EIC is Professor Alexander Muacevic who has a self speaking CV He is the president of the International Radiosurgery society.

4. Cureus editorial board is very broad and you can see high calibre researchers all over the world.

5. Cureus is an on line journal with no APC fees other than Has - in house- preferred editing services with low burden on the authors shoulders.

6. Cureus has very clear guidance and support from submission to publication, very author friendly.

7. Their One of the unique feature Is Allows post publication Scoring by any readers (SIQ scoring) and you can make any instant COMMENTS like rapid response letter submission without any boundaries which I love and admire this feature.

8. There is section allows medical students competitions ( which I haven’t interrogated this section yet).

9. Cureus web site is quite didactic and easy to follow.

CONS:

1. Cureus is one of the fastest reviewing process; some researchers would find it a bit unusual and questionable but for me this is fantastic! As a reviewer and Editor, if I appoint revireviewer , I wish they should respond the reviewing request fast( accept or reject) in days nothin weeks and if they agree to review, I would like to see their review report on the submission system in maximum 2 weeks time.

2. I think, Their rejection rates low But don’t see published rubbish articles so far in their system and as of today I read and scored nearly 500 articles.

3. Cannot tract journal impact factor for some reason.

I think Cureus should be promoted to one of the Science Citation Index ( expanded) journal. as you know it is indexing at ESCI.

Cureus is not in the predatory journals Bells list.

I personally continue to submit my pieces to that lovely journal.

I hope I would be able to eluded the question.

Kind regards,

Dr.Emre Pakdemirli

I think just a waste of time.

The given few samples from the year 2015. I also have seen some retracted papers from Cureus but also highly popular journal called The New Journal of England which has a sky high IF. As EIC stated 2015, “ No journal is perfect“ and I can assure you avarage review time about 7-14 days not in 2 days. My latest articles reviewed by 5 reviwer and lasted about a month from submission to publication in the journal ( not Visible in PubMed yet)

its a high calibre, multitask a very good journal and I would recommend it to anybody without reservations.

Kind regards,

Emre

Some Strange Goings On at Cureus https://www.emeraldcityjournal.com/2016/08/some-strange-goings-on-at-cureus/

Samia Husain , I did not try to publish in Cureus Journals as I am unsure if these are predatory or not; they send frequent invitation emails and some of the journals are indexed on PubMed, maybe that's why they have become attractive for student researches.

Hi Saima

I followed your question when I planned to submit my manuscript.

I thought to answer you now as I think I am in a position to add to everyone's knowledge...

I submitted my first manuscript in this journal last month, the process of submission I found easier than other journals. The editor selected and was then reviewed by reviewers chosen by them... On advise, revised the manuscript and re-submitted which then went for Editor approval and after few days selected for publication on answering additional questions. This was a very nice and encouraging experience with the article published within weeks rather months when you wait to know that your manuscript is rejected.

This is the link " doi:10.7759/cureus.11320 "

Later, submitted another paper but was rejected for selection for review by editor within a day...

So I can say that experience is good, easier submission process, PubMed indexed peer-reviewed journal, with the journal to publication as a matter of days to weeks. It does reject if, think, will not add much to research...

I still wish to submit more to this journal and encourage others to submit too

Cureus may not be a perfect medical journal but it is a pubmed journal which is a big pro for fellowship students completing their publication requirement for fellowship exit exams

Is this journal is Scopus indexed?

No, but it is PubMed and Web of Science indexed. It's a good (not extraordinary) journal.

When editors describe their own journal as surgical sink for publication, alot of queries are automatically answered. The editors just wanted a repository for their work, paid for indexation which was originally in pubmed central where all manuscripts can be deposited. I think I can safely say that the editors were not lying, they meant what they said, dump your manuscript in an authorised bin!! I do not intend to hurt any sentiments or provoke any hatred, but even if it's easier to publish in this journal there are alot of cons of publishing in such journals. People who give credit for such publications are also not well exposed to the nuances of their review process. A time may soon come when no credit would be given for such publications. As far as my country's scenario is concerned, we do not get any credit for a publication that is published in a journal that has no impact factor. You can always support new journals by writing and reviewing for them. I would also like to ask how many of you would even consider sending your manuscript to them if cureus did not deposit them in pubmed central? I am assuming almost noone.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/pub/addjournal/

"Any journal that submits an application that meets all the pre-application requirements undergoes an evaluation process. As part of the evaluation process, the National Library of Medicine (NLM) considers a journal’s scope as well as the scientific and editorial quality of the publication. Journals selected for inclusion in PMC are also evaluated on technical quality. Publishers are encouraged to read through all steps and review PMC's policies before submitting an application".

They do not accept every paper and being indexed in PMC is a very good thing. Moreover, they are WoS indexed. We're not talking about Nature, of course; but Cureus is a scientific journal.

It's no a predator journal. It can be considered as low quality journal and publishing in it depends on the quality of your article and whether it can be accepted in another specialized journal

I agree with dr Amr A Arafat

Still it is pubmed indexed and provides platform to your article to maximum reach.

I just used Cureus recently and I'm very pleased with the submission and review process. Submission is easy and straightforward and I think ALL journals should really start to think about how to make manuscript submission process clear and easy to follow. This is for the benefit of everyone, authors and the journals alike!

I was skeptical when they asked me to suggest reviewers myself but then I realized they actually mandate also other reviewers that I have not suggested to review the manuscript IN ADDITION to those I suggested, which I think is a good idea. Also, I got really good feedback and suggestions from both sides. I think my article looked much neater after the peer review process. They are not 100% free which I'm OK with, specially with their cost being relatively cheaper than other OA journals.

What is important for me in any publication process is that:

1. the peer review process is credible and reasonably quick

2. if someone resarches "Google scholars" or "PubMed" with key words related to my article they will be able to find my article

Cureus met these 2 key principles and I decided to continue using it from now on!

Most journals ask for opposed reviewers. Plus a quick peer review does not mean a credible review. Any article published in pubmed can be searched via key words. We have established that it is a journal in pubmed so gets some benefits but the peer review or the sheer speed of it does not make credible . I would like to add that impact factor is the most reliable metric for assessing the quality of a journal and it doesn't have that. Sorry if it hurts the sentiments of anyone, but we as authors, publish for a variety of reasons and sometimes we do choose journals that are not good enough but available enough. It is a medium available to all but that does not make it credible, it is just a very "available" option for people who just want to be a published author in pubmed!

Impact factor (IF) is not without its limitations and, unfortunately, does not directly relate to the peer review process. It is a reflection of citation rate, which depends on many other factors, and obviously relatively new journals will have to wait few years before their IF see the light. Quick peer eview process does not mean credible review but slow review process does not mean credible review either! Ideas that are not published in journals with high IF does not make them low quality ideas. I see no harm in just wanting "to be published author in pubmed", as far as you did what it takes to be so as determined by other peers, and as far as it will be available for others to read and determine for themselves if this is something that interest them or not. The whole process is not perfect, and will never be, but this is probably the best we have so far.

There is actually no peer review at cureus. Imagine blind leading the blind. Imagine you being a well read author and a published one, would you have time to review and unknown manuscript in 2 days? No way! If impact factor is not "the measure" why do people crave to be published in big journals? The answer lies in what you want from the publication, just an easy quick fix to be published in "something" that is indexed in pubmed. That's all, then yes, go for cureus, otherwise, no. Just my opinion. People get published in online journals that are wiped off the internet in some years, it's their choice. I am not judging anyone for it, on this forum I wanted to know what the "experts" think of it. Obviously people who publish in it are going to say good things about it, there is a very good reason why they chose it in the first place. Maybe they did know that the publication would be suited to only cureus, maybe they had been denied publication in other journals, n because pubmed indexation is "considered" a huge feat, they decided to get published there. Impact factor was , is and would continue to be the measure for assessing publications. Imagine writing n throwing things in an electrical bun! What use does it have if no1 reads or builds upon your findings. That is what impact factor judges, citations! Referencing! That is when an "actual peer" who knows about the subject, reads ,reviews and tries to make some sense out of the publication.

Just because the peer review in Cureus is quick does not mean it does not exist. The “experts” that I heard from in national meetings (when we used to have those!) will tell you that in 2 days you can actually review much more than one manuscript! The more expert you are, the quicker you will be in reviewing manuscripts (and enjoying it during the process). What Im trying to say is that impact factor (alone) is not the only way to go and is not without limitations, but yes it is (one) important factor that we should look for.

Does is it indexed in scopus?

Hi Hossein Neamatzadeh

No, but it is indexed in PubMed and Web of Science [1, 2].

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/journals/2757/

[2] https://bit.ly/2Z8BKkt

I consider Cureus a good journal. It is a modern, agile and open access channel and I hope that the future trend of scientific publication will converge to such methods.

It is interesting to note that traditional scientific journals and editors continuously operate in the shadow to suppress or minimize the credibility and impact index of all Open Access scientific journals. It is time to reconsider such a myth.

Please consider the following information: The Government of Pedro Sánchez (Spain) has injected more than 7 million in the editor of the scientific journal "The Lancet", where recently his health spokesman Fernando Simón published a letter that praised his management and criticized his questioning from politics or the press because "they harm the response» to the pandemic. The case was widely commented on by Spain's scientific community and even to the public in general.

The source is here:

And the previous case was not unique. Please, remember the Lancet retraction of an article based on false data regarding the use of Hydroxychloroquine. After a lot of complaints from the scientific community, the article was correctly retracted. More details here: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)31180-6/fulltext

In contrast to Cureus or the open-access journal in general, nobody questions the reputation of Lancet. Please, I am not criticizing Lancet, I am only presenting two cases to promote a fair reflection regarding good Open Access Journals.

By the way, there is a CiteFactor for Cureus that can be accessed here:

I fully share Dr. Emre Pakdemirli 's comments.

In my opinion,Cureus´s peer-reviewing system is rigourus and exhaustive.

Beyond Cureus Journal, the peer-reviewing process should be fully public in all indexed journals

What is your definition of exhaustive? I agree to disagree with cureus publications being credible. Just an indexation in pubmed does not make that journal credible. Plus if impact factors are a joke to people who publish in that journal why are you people so bothered about giving clarifications for its lack of an impact factor? There is not even a single person in this discussion who said good things about them but has not published with them. Publishing with them and then saying good things is ok, and justifiable because obviously they published your research. But the lack of an impact factor makes it unreliable. If it is that good why can't it get an impact factor? Just food for thought!

I used the term exhaustive because in my experience as a reviewer, the manuscripts were completely reviewed including several rounds with author-reviewer interaction. Reviewers are always two or more, showing excellent expertise to support their opinions. The final result was a much better paper.I didn´t publish in Cureus and I don´t know the rate of rejected manuscripts.

The impact factor is essential and should be improved.e.g : a lot of editors coauthored several papers published in each issue of his journal.Is it ethically fair?

How do you know that the process is rigorous if you didn't publish in it?If you reviewed for them, you were indirectly involved with those publications. Plus how credible is a journal that allows editors to co-author on several articles in each issue? You are making exact sense in answering why the credibility of this journal is questionable. Plus maybe that's why it doesn't have an impact factor!

Of course,in some way I´m involved as a reviewer and that job is the source of my opinions.

About editors as coauthors, yours was a misinterpretation.In my experience, I haven´t seen it happen in Cureus.

I don´t think this discussion is going to get to any satisfactory ending for either of us.So, I suggest respecting each other´s opinion.Personally I can assure you I don´t ¨ joke¨ when I do my revisions.

Conflict of interest there. It is not a neutral discussion. But I actually got a satisfactory answer and majorly thanks to you.

Well, I think it has a different approach towards publications, and while working often as a reviewer I myself found it different than others, everything is digitalised and many mistakes are highlighted upon submission. Referring your point, that it accept every article submitted is not the fact, I have published a paper and the next one is in line but two of my colleague's manuscripts are rejected, which I considered at par or better than mine. Furthermore, the impact factor for it has recently been calculated and it hovers around at 1.1, which is quite acceptable.

How has that been calculated? An impact factor cannot be calculated until and unless a journal satisfies certain criteria! However I do agree with you that the journal is different.

I do not measure the value of a publication by the journal where it was published. It is the weight of the idea to the field of knowledge that should be used as the metric, and sometimes it is not possible to evaluate that immediately.

From the dominant "Impact Factor" point of view, Fermat's Last Theorem would be a Zero value publication. He wrote the theorem in the margin of a book!

Do you know that the "Bose-Einstein Statistics" was the personal idea of Satyendra Nath Bose but he had his article rejected by Philosophical Magazine? He had to send the article to Einstein who translated it into German and was immediately published in Zeitschrift für Physik (1924). The name Satyendra Nath Bose was not good enough for the fancy journals.

Seven years ago, in 2013, Randy Schekman, a Nobel prize winner, declared that he would no longer be publishing his papers in the big prestigious “luxury” journals.

Writing in the Guardian, Schekman raises serious concerns over the journals' practices and calls on others in the scientific community to take action.

Schekman criticises Nature, Cell and Science for artificially restricting the number of papers they accept, a policy he says stokes demand "like fashion designers who create limited-edition handbags." He also attacks a widespread metric called an "impact factor", used by many top-tier journals in their marketing.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/dec/09/nobel-winner-boycott-science-journals

Very interesting comments. I specifically loved the analogy to the limited edition handbags by fashion designers! But, the nobel prize winner declared that after writing for the said journals.

@Samia Hussain, everyone has their own mind sets, and they think in their own perspective, I think the Nobel laureate would have observed something special in those journals, and that's why he took the decision on that basis. Me, you, and all around here cant foresee things that way, hence we can only just covet to be a laureate, but cant. If he has taken the decision on that basis, we shall agree and respect, else we are questioning his nominee as a Nobel Laureate.

Regards

@ bilal Khan he did not endorse cureus though. It's like twisting stuff. He said that for nature that charges an exorbitant sum for each publication. And nobel prize is not given only for research it's given for ideas and not all nobel nominees think so that impact factors are useless. Let's put things into perspective first. Before generalizing stuff to a journal that is to date "shady"!

@Samia Husain! I construed it as if he did, like you said, he declared the winner after writing for the said journal. Anyhow, I expostulate publishing in a journal, if one is not satisfied with.

Regards

@ bilal Khan I assume you did not understand what he said! Or you have misconstrued it and lost the point altogether, but it is ok . A wise man once said that people only see things through their respective lens! As far as the journal is considered I don't intend to publish in cureus. We have already established that. People who have reviewed/written in that journal should say good things about it because after all they published their manuscripts, which I believe now we're not being published by any other respectable journal. I have written in local journals, international journals, big european journals, journals indexed in pubmed,journals with impact factors and those without. I very well understand the differences but I do not endorse any of them. Sometimes some manuscripts are not suited for some journals, because they are not discussing novel Ideas or innovation and good authors learn from it instead of finding a loop-hole! By loop hole I mean a journal that is indexed but has no proper review system or jmpact factor. Moreover, this discussion was not started to demean any author/reviewer, I just wanted to discuss the thoughts/reasons that lead people to opt publishing in it. But the sad thing is that most authors/reviewers from 'that journal' are only happy because they do not have to wait, or suffer a rejection, plus they get a readymade template to

temper ! Which in my opinion is shallow!

May be, I agree, that's your point. And, lest not impose what you believe right is right for others, let them be happy with what they have, or else if we start making parameters and putting stringent criterion, then I think wont be appropriate.

Stay blessed!

It used to be an easy process but now they made more strict regulations and reviewing process. But I see some papers there that are of a great quality and cited a lot in subsequent literature. It offers an advantage of a speedy process and free of charge.

I ended up here because a friend consulted me about publishing in it. I got curious and took a look at it. Several things put me off. Below are some examples.

“Articles with formatting and language errors identified during preliminary review will require an editing fee, however, Cureus does not charge article publication fees.”

- Their editing service is somewhat expensive, and I say that as a self-employed editor who is not cheap. Moreover, their website needs to be edited. That comma before “however” in the sentence I quoted above is a comma split.

BUT: “All non-channel/competition review articles require the purchase of our Preferred Editing service.”

- What does non-channel/competition review articles mean anyway?

ALSO: “Only well-drafted, relevant, credible submissions with few or no errors will be permitted to publish for free. Articles with too many errors WILL BE REQUIRED TO PURCHASE OUR Preferred Editing service.”

- Reputable journals will ask you to have it edited but do not care who edits it even if they have their own service.

“All authors should invite unbiased and expert reviewers who will provide critical feedback. … Two completed reviews are required in order to proceed, one of which must be from a reviewer invited by Cureus. This requirement WILL BE WAIVED AFTER 21 DAYS if two author-invited reviews have been submitted.”

- As an author, I can invite friends to review my submission in 24 hours. But as a seasoned journal senior editor, I know that the bottle neck is finding reviewers. An editor can spend several weeks (even more) to find two reviewers.

Thank you so much... Amin Bredan.. it is such a relief that people like you exist on this forum. Because these details would not have been brought to light without the effort you made. It's a sham of a journal. I completely agree with your views. extremely poor peer review at the journal

A shady peer review,curiously odd editing service that edits all articles so that it makes some money out of it, frequent retractions and weird editors, is it even a journal?

A colleague suggested Cureus after being a co-author of one of their articles (not sure if editing services have been paid). After submitting a case report as a test , I am afraid this could be one of the many shams. It's probably not worth the effort. I have written to them asking why a short piece written by a group of British-educated authors required an US$245 editing service (foreign last names acknowledged). If I hear anything exciting I will provide an update. Samia Husain

Thank you Elaine YL Leung. It would help uncover alot of things!Much appreciated.

but after searching I found it has impact factor 1.15 for the years 2020 and 2021, is it fake?

Dear Jabar Ali ,

According to https://mjl.clarivate.com/home the journal “Cureus” is indexed in the ESCI index of Clarivate. This means two things it is eligible for a possible impact factor but right now they don’t have one. The reason why they (still) have no impact factor is most likely because of their peer review process that is not fully accepted by everyone: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cureus

Indeed the ‘impact factor’ of 1.15 is fake (https://www.citefactor.org/impact-factor/impact-factor-of-journal-Cureus.php). It is called CiteFactor which is a well-known example of a misleading metric, see for more info about this: https://beallslist.net/misleading-metrics/

The only real impact factor is assigned for journals indexed in the SCIE (/SSCI) of Clarivate. Scopus has its own ‘impact factor’ called CiteScore.

Best regards.

Thank you Rob Keller for your valuable contribution. The reason cureus is a- not-so credible journal is it's peer review process!

I don’t know how I found myself here!

But I read all posts and I am very happy to see this level of awareness. In my opinion, it is not only important to avoid publishing in shady journals but also AVOID citing articles published in those journals. If you cite a research article from shady journal, you are helping them indirectly way. Check for a reference that is published in well-known journal!

Abdullah Al-Taiar

Reading this conversation, I believe that many people forget what the role of science is, namely to advance progress.

It seems that many are more interested in personal prestige than in improving the world we live in.

Each paper should be evaluated for its criteria regardless of the journal in which it is published.

The phenomenon of predatory journalism should not be fought by penalizing the authors or their studies, especially if these can provide a valuable contribution to a specific sector.

The ideal process when deciding to cite a paper is to make an independent assessment of its quality (otherwise the phenomena of withdrawals would no longer exist). On some occasions, published peer-reviewed papers even mention pre-prints. Citing a paper from Nature should not require more or less attention than citing a paper from Cureus or any other journal.

Many pre-prints out there are valid and unpublished due to the constraints related to the unsustainable fees. So what do we do? Do we ignore them?

In your opinion, during the COVID-19 pandemic, agencies such as WHO, FDA, and EMA waited for publications in academic journals or independently considered and analyzed pre-prints because the time to publish in journals was too long?

This idea of ​​entrusting the credibility of a paper to the journal in which it is published has nothing to do with science, but only with the personal career.

That said, it is clear that it is inconvenient for an author to publish in a predatory journal as no real reviews are performed. But the danger should not be that of compromising his reputation as much as that of publishing useless data to the scientific community, which must be the judge who delivers the final sentence. The danger is to expose an inconsistent paper to the scrutiny of scientists.

I have published in Cureus but also in journals with an impact factor (JMIR Publications).

I agree that there are aspects of the Cureus of dubious validity; however, being indexed in PubMed and Web of Science exposes you to the judgment of the scientific community. The same goes for the post-publication "vote" in Cureus: if your article is not worthy, then it will be reported.

If we take into account the economic aspect, even though these 200-300$ may be unjustified, let's not forget that there are prestigious journals that, from one day to the next, raise their fees by 500$ for no apparent reason.

Furthermore, the reviews I received from Cureus have been many (on average from 3 to 4 reviewers), and not infrequently, they have been very critical.

How to solve the problem of predatory journalism? Lowering publication costs or paying peer reviewers so they can publish with accumulated credit (as JMIR does) would be much more impactful than avoiding citing papers from specific journals deemed "shady" without proven reasons.

I have been following this post for a while now. Now that I have had exposure to Cureus I can comment on this. I was initially concerned about submitting in this journal due to conflicting opinions about it and concerns about the absence of an impact factor. However, on submitting my article to them I did find the requirement to purchase the editing service a bit strange. However, their peer review service was extremely prompt and thorough. I can say the quality of the review compares to the standard I have seen with other well known journals. I also love their slogan of 'peer-review not peer-reject', which gives authors the chance to make as much corrections as needed without compromising the opportunity to publish. I think the journal is an extremely useful resource for newer researchers like myself who yet have much more to learn.

I think we should accept a journal for what it is rather than getting riled up when people comment on its review process or credibility. These testaments can be accepted if any editors or authors who write for " some prestigious journals"(as you called them)and have also published in this journal would come out in support. But,this seems very less likely to happen because no one from that group would come and publish in cureus. Furthermore this discussion was started to know whether or not this has more to offer than just an outlet for students to publish. It should be called a student magazine indexed in pubmed. And there should be no shame in accepting that, after all it provided a platform to students. But constantly trying to push the idea that it is more than what meets the eye is a bit unfair to "actual" journals.

I have personal experiences when I fought plagiarism in cureus articles. When I reported that an author committed plagiarism and used false images to support his research, I was shut down by Dr. John Adler and his editorial staff citing that I had a personal grudge against the authors. He refused to retract the paper until many other authors joined in to get the paper retracted. The entire process seemed extremely difficult and corrosive. No wonder nobody comes forward because the editorial staff actively protect authors who plagiarize. Any source of plagiarism should be investigated regardless of how it was detected. In my case I read the article when it was referred to me by a friend who found it eerily similar to his article.

Secondly, Dr John Adler and his staff report authors for plagiarism to their affliated institutions only if they are from third world countries. I asked Mr Adler to report the authors to University of Arizona and he didn't again citing personal grudge as a reason not to. In another instance when my friend reported a author from Pakistan, he was promptly reported to my institution without asking him for his connection with he author. This discriminatory practice is extremely alarming and new authors should think twice before publishing here.

Disclaimer: I have published three articles with cureus and their review process is extremely shady. You can invite fake reviewers and literally do it yourself. Recently they have added their own reviewer for the process which makes it a little better.

Me and my friend reviewed an article that was entirely copied from another Pubmed article. Cureus doesn't screen for plagiarism at all. Some highschool's have better plagiarism detector than cureus.

Samia Husain There are some dilemmas in this discussion that are omitted.

1) Being indexed in two of the most important science and medicine databases is not a trivial matter. By this, I do not mean to defend Cureus but to emphasize that instead of throwing accusations on a forum it would be necessary to do what a good scientist would do, that is to contact PubMed and Web of Science and notify the problem that has been detected.

2) Many authors publish in low-cost journals as there are no funds and the waiver policies of most journals require extreme conditions to be applied. Hence, publishing in a PubMed and WoS indexed journal exposes you to the judgment of the scientific community, which must not have prejudices related to the journals on which a paper is published (and, fortunately, this is not the case since there are papers published on Cureus positively cited in much more prestigious journals). Plus, post-publication voting is ideally a way to know what readers think of your article.

3) "But, this seems very less likely to happen because no one from that group would come and publish in Cureus." This is prejudice. I know several authors who constantly publish in journals with IF - and/or considered more prestigious by the scientific community - who have also published in Cureus.

Therefore, to the question "Is it worth it?" I say that being indexed on PubMed and WoS is always worthwhile since, regardless of the journal itself, they are two of the most used databases by scientists; ergo, the scientific community will express itself about your work. Furthermore, I repeat: if the credibility of Cureus is so compromised, so is that of PubMed and WoS; i.e., it would be appropriate, on the side of those who have detected these problems, to report it to those in charge.

Finally, this should be borne in mind: "The research counts, not the journal!" Nobel Laureates speak out against impact factors https://twitter.com/NobelPrize/status/877804020345262080

Should we consider the Impact Factor as a quality index of an academic journal or the articles published in it? My answer is "LOL" [1-49].

[1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27466089/

[2] https://ease.org.uk/impact-factor-statement/

[3] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27411614/

[4] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23805088/

[5] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/pmc2140038/

[6] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25742806/

[7] https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/00220410810844150/full/html

[8] https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1467-9574.2008.00408.x

[9] https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/07/hate-journal-impact-factors-new-study-gives-you-one-more-reason

[10] https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200304/cmselect/cmsctech/399/39912.htm

[11] https://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/57500

[12] https://ease.org.uk/impact-factor-statement/

[13] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9056804/

[14] https://www.researchgate.net/publication/279402178_The_Metric_Tide_Report_of_the_Independent_Review_of_the_Role_of_Metrics_in_Research_Assessment_and_Management

[15] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1751157711000666

[16] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/0160932777901077

[17] https://arxiv.org/abs/1010.0278

[18] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16749869/

[19] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17965570/

[20] https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/leap.1335

[21] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22301307/

[22] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22403371/

[23] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9056791/

[24] https://arxiv.org/abs/1801.08992

[25] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29420505/

[26] https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1362168818767191

[27] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18661263/

[28] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23300920/

[29] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29211744/

[30] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29515380/

[31] https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/asi.21232

[32] https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0011392113512839

[33] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30747708/

[34] https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/36096679.pdf

[35] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11845174/

[36] https://www.nature.com/articles/palcomms2016105

[37] https://academic.oup.com/spp/article-abstract/39/6/751/1620724?redirectedFrom=fulltext

[38] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25903611/

[39] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/10517624/

[40] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16749869/

[41] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27411614/

[42] https://www.mathunion.org/fileadmin/IMU/Report/CitationStatistics.pdf

[43] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15973362/

[44] https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/asi.22731

[45] https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/304667862.pdf

[46] http://altmetrics.org/manifesto

[47] https://theplosblog.plos.org/2016/07/impact-factors-do-not-reflect-citation-rates/

[48] https://www.the-scientist.com/the-nutshell/ditching-impact-factors-for-deeper-data-33224

[49] https://physicstoday.scitation.org/do/10.1063/PT.5.8183/full/

@John Adler

Another instance of plagiarism that is completely missed by the reviewers and quality control staff of Cureus. This shows that the entire process is rigged. The reviewers do not care and cureus takes a small fee for editing.

I was doing a literature review on multiple sclerosis and I found this study in the Cureus Journal of medical sciences published on 19th May 2021.

Title: Nutritional and Biochemical Parameters Among Multiple Sclerosis Patients: A Case-Control Study Link:

I found a similar study published in Neurology India (another PubMed Indexed Journal) that is published a year before (August 2020).

Title: A Controlled Descriptive Study to Determine the Nutritional Status and Biochemical Parameters of Multiple Sclerosis Patients Link:

The results, figures, and the decision tree model of both of these studies are almost exactly the same. The texts in the methodology, introduction, and discussion also bear a striking resemblance. I double-checked it because I wasn't sure that the publishing department of Cureus was going to miss this. This is a huge concern for the medical publishing community and strict action should be taken against the authors who try to copy the work of others

I am actually waiting for a reply from @John Adler where he grills me about my relationship with the authors and how I came about this information and how I am going to benefit from this retraction. For a social media company (yes it's not a journal) that touts transparency and quality through long-term peer review from its customer base ( so-called SIQ), it sure is a lot slower to accept retractions because of blatant plagiarism that they should have picked themselves. We are not talking about critical review of any article or evaluating its strengths. We are talking about copy-paste articles that get routinely published in Cureus.

Should this be the conduct of a medical journal, asking for money to advertise your research on social media? Like I said this journal is a social media company that runs on a free user base that peers reviews for them in exchange for discounts and coupons for their next publication. Its biggest revenue source is going to be advertising now that it has grown its user base. @John Adler

Dear Muhammad Hamza ,

The information provided by NLM is not entirely correct. The journal is included in PubMed. According to: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog/101596737 It is all a matter of definition, according to: https://www.nlm.nih.gov/bsd/serfile_addedinfo.html I quote “Approximately 30,000 records are included in the PubMed journal list which is updated daily and includes all MEDLINE® titles as well as other non-MEDLINE titles in PubMed.” So, in short, a paper/journal can be included in PubMed by three different ways: 1. When Medline indexed, 2. As a PMC journal, 3. Author manuscripts that are deposited when the research is funded by NIH.

“Cureus” is not lying when they claim to be indexed/included in PubMed, but they are not indexed in the way more prestigious Medline database. Personally, I find the info in your reply about extra (paid) “services” way more disturbing. I agree that a journal/publisher needs some source of income to cover the costs but their choice to go for some sort of advertising your work is dubious. I have my doubts about the fact that you basically 'sponsor' the exposure of your work to a broader audience (when your work is good and interesting it will happen for free in newspapers and magazines)

It looks (too much) like what companies like Research Outreach and ResearchPod are doing, see for discussions about them:

Together with what is already said about them (and all the disturbing examples you mentioned) I very much doubt the credibility of this journal.

Best regards.

Simply put, if something's too good to be true then it likely is. Free Open Access and peer review within days? Yeah no. Doesn't matter if it's indexed, it's still a shady journal used by many students/trainees to pad their CVs with easy pubs. There are plenty of free subscription based journals with an impact factor, an adequate quartile ranking, and a history of proper peer reviewing. Even the less prestigious articles that I've dealt with had a rigorous peer reviewing process.

If you're looking for a quick and easy way to add pubs to your CV, then go ahead use Cureus. You'd be surprised by how many people actually lack the proper knowledge to assess a journal's legitimacy, and I'm talking about people who are supposedly academic and "passionate" about research. Then you have people who publish with Cureus and who will pat you and themselves on the back.

Thing is, the blame lies on the modern expectations from what a physician should be. A lot of people have zero interest in research but are obligated to publish so they remain competitive and relevant in the eyes of senior physicians. That's what journals like Cureus capitalize on, they know a lot of people are desperate and will pick the easy way out (not that I blame them).

Bottom line is, unless you urgently need to pad your CV, choose another journal. I'm not saying IF makes a journal more legitimate than others but a proper peer review does

I believe that the opportunity to publish in a pubmed indexed journal at a low cost should be an opportunity that non academic based authors should be appreciative of.

Open access journals have ridiculous APCs which excludes authors from developing countries from participating.

I will definitely give this forum some consideration.

Muhammad Hamza Rob Keller Walid Alam Samia Husain Abdullah Al-Taiar

1. The following was a really promising article which was submitte@d to a pubmed indexed journal with a really strict review process. After a year of 'attempted reviewing by the journal ' this was the final reply I got from them.

Dear Dr,

Thank you again for your submission 8864598 titled "xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx'. I wanted to keep you informed that we have attempted to assign several Academic Editors, however, unfortunately none of them have agreed to oversee the manuscript's review process.

We will continue seeking alternative Academic Editors to handle your manuscript, however, I understand that the lack of progress to date may be disappointing. Therefore, we are seeking confirmation on whether you are happy for us to keep going with the peer-review process.

I look forward to receiving your response'

The above article was really well written with numerous well explained schematic illustrative images and supplemented by ihc evidence.

For a frequent publisher like me , this was a very highly demotivating statement. A manuscript rejecting a journal is one thing. But I really don't know what to tell about a journal which cannot complete a peer review process after a whole year. By then I had seen that in pubmed several other articles had appeared on the same topic. In situations like these we really need a journal which can respond and review to submitted manuscripts and index them on time.

2. The following was yet another comprehensive pathology review article with close to 70 citations which was submitted to the same journal. The journal could not get the article reviewed even 5 months after submission and this was their last response.

'Dear Dr. Ramkumar,

Unfortunately, no Editor has yet accepted the review invitation.

I understand that the lack of progress to date may be disappointing. Therefore, we are seeking confirmation on whether you are happy for us to keep going with the peer-review process, or you prefer to withdraw it.

Best regards,

xxxxxx'

Both the above articles were well written with numerous supporting images, citations and references. It took me almost 6 months to format the articles with several hours of editing to get them fit enough for publication.

3. The articles went through submission to yet another prestigious pubmed indexed journal who came up with the the following reasons for rejection:

' Thanks for submitting your article to xxxx. We read your article with interest but we are sorry to disappoint you this time, as the manuscript is a review article and as per our journal’s protocol, review articles are only invited reviews through Editor-in-Chief. I would further like to state that apart from reviewer's comments there are several factors that are taken into consideration while taking the final decision for any manuscript. We hope you will keep submitting your articles in the future.

Editor-in-Chief'

'REVIEW Articles are purely by INVITATION ONLY.

Editor-in-Chief'

The above journal could have atleast asked for a resubmission as a case series. The manuscripts were outright rudely rejected by the editor in chief without any peer review. Kindly do note that the online submission system in these journals themselves take an hour to complete the process. Also me being a promising pathology consultant in the field with several years of experience, I clearly do have the qualifications to write a pathology review article and will continue to write several in future.

4. Yet another journal who did accept the manuscripts requested a publishing fee of 1970 USD!! The above amount in inr is 1,43,858 inr which is far less than what the average indian pathologist earns per month!! I really don't know what kind of medical self sponsored researcher could afford such a humongous charge!!

Both the above articles have now been published in a good pubmed indexed journal and have generated several hundred reviews. The published manuscripts have been shared online in various pathology online forums and no one had any conflicts of interest or controversies whatsoever. I am happy that my hard work has finally been realised.

In today's world high impact medical journal publishing seems to be deemed only for ivy league universities and research institutes from first world countries. There are very promising scholars and researchers all over the world who execute promising publishing work but limited by scope due to various reasons.

In situations like these a journal like cureus is definitely a cherished asset for the medical publishing community. I clearly support the journal's policy and non racist approach that every research work needs to be valued and heard in the medical publishing community with a fast and reliable review process . Research work should be published in the right time and should be open for debate by everyone. This will encourage the researcher to polish his research work , constantly upgrade and further contribute to medical community. I further support the journal's idea in promoting the article on social media. Cause rare case reports are rare. They are likely to be accessed rarely because of the rarity of the case presentation. For such situations, getting a social media boost for a nominal fee is quite worthwhile. What better way can a publisher get more views for the tremendous hardwork that goes behind in writing a paper? If you are so critical about the journal's publishing approach then several hundred conflicting remarks should have flooded the internet regarding the quality of papers published on cureus. Every article that is published on cureus is open for Scholarly index quotient rating and further panel discussion through a separate comment box at the end of each article. Everyone seems to point out the fact that very few articles might have escaped their strict screening system. These articles have further been retracted from pubmed. But no one seems to appreciate the fact about several thousands of other superb articles that the journal has published so far. I hope that the medical publishing community will utilize the publishing policies of this fantastic journal in the right context , change the approach, attitude and future norms of medical publishing. I myself will continue to publish with cureus for the rest of my career.

Subramaniam Ramkumar

While I understand your frustrations, this looks more like you being unable to find the proper journal for your research. Some journals explicitly state that reviews are only through invitation and not to try submitting them before you at least email the editor. Other journals are interested in specific topics only and will not accept papers even if your paper's subject falls under the umbrella of a broader field in the journal.

Of nine papers I currently have published, and three more recently accepted, I never had to wait for more than 2-3 months for an update. I have never gotten rejections without feedback unless rejections were a week after I submitted my work. Even for journals that took time to review my submissions, the reviewers gave extensive feedback and almost always helped me improve my original work. Let's not forget than reviewers aren't paid and they do this in their free time which inevitably impacts the time it takes to review someone else's work.

Cureus' main purpose is to let people publish anything in a "PubMed indexed" journal. No actual peer reviewing can be done in less than a week unless it's very poorly done or the reviewers are paid and that's their main source of work, in which case it's in their benefit to accept every publication and make the authors pay.

There are plenty of free journals that are transparent and give you an estimate of the time it takes to review your article. I am by no means claiming to be an expert, but I cannot in good faith blindly recommend Cureus, especially to first time authors. People interested in a career in academia will likely be hurt by publishing in journals like Cureus. It's fine if you run out of options but insist on publishing, but you can't expect people to be impressed when all your publications are with the same controversial journal.

I understand you had a poor experience with a couple of journals but that can't be generalized to the majority of journals that care less about monetary exploitation and more about maintaining their standards.

I guess it all depends on the reviewer... Look, when I receive invitations to review an article, I usually put my heart and soul in it, i devote around 4 to 5 hours, I check pubmed to read more about the topic I am reviewing. I check the gap in knowledge, see if this article adds extra info to the current data in the literature. But not all reviewers in Cureus do that. Usually, when we are reviewing an article, the comments of the other reviewers are shown. Unfortunately, and in all the articles that I have reviewed, the other reviewer comments were kind of sketchy or useless. Some reviewers had only 2-3 comments on an article full of errors!

So yeah it depends on the reviewer..

Muhammad Hamza I just went the peer-review process with this journal, and I can tell you that PLAGURISM is next to impossible with this journal. They took my manuscript and showed me which parts of my manuscript were taken from which article or book or blog, EVEN if it was something that I had written elsewhere. They allow a certain low percentage to be from other sources, but you still have to explain yourself.

This is the place to make a fair debate: the Cureus' Editor will answer all our questions (June 24, 2021).

"As Cureus continues its mission to create equity in medical publishing, a small but vocal minority has expressed reservations about the quality of our peer review and publication process.

With groundbreaking and disruptive innovation come scrutiny and criticism, and Cureus is no exception. Medical publishing is a broken system tied to paywalls, politics, and elitist gate keeping and Cureus will continue to push boundaries as we work to set a new standard in publishing. Publishing peer-reviewed articles doesn’t need to take months or cost thousands of dollars.

Join Editor-in-Chief Dr. John Adler for a no-holds-barred Q&A where he will answer all of your questions about Cureus and the medical publishing establishment."

Alessandro Rovetta Wow...now, THAT is transparency!

If we are a "small minority" as this high and mighty editor thinks, why address us?

Samia Husain If you don't want to be addressed and have whatever questions you have answered, don't attend. Methinks that you've got a bee in your bonnet for some other reason. When someone is suspicious of transparency, the problem may lie in the transparency of that someone.

I'll tell you why. Because, the moment you search cureus on Google you know what shows up on first page? This thread! That leads to all of the "future naive aspirant authors" to look past this journal. It's not transparency as someone has pointed out, but it's a business move. And if you don't understand this, you are welcome to continue publishing in it . However, a time is going to come when no prestigious institution would give credit to any of these publications.

Samia Husain

I do agree with the previous reply. If you have serious questions regarding this issue why don't you cite this thread and ask Dr John Adler himself. I think cureus is a great asset to the medical community and I will continue publishing in it. A well respected ivy league institute would give equal preference to the content that is published in addition to other pointers like impact factor of the journal.

I see that many people have different experiences while publishing with this journal. I know cureus has improved its peer review process and publication ethics quite considerably....... Which was the exact motive for this discussion..... Constructive criticism. Still, I believe cureus can be better.

I do have to disclose that I have had considerable lengthy debates with Dr Adler and I found him extremely responsive yet condescending...... Which is befitting of an ex stanford professor..... And he does know alot about modern medical publishing. My problem with him is how he trivialises my concerns and yet does exactly what the "minority" recommends.

However I do think that they haven't addressed my concerns about their recent business practices of charging fees for research advertisement. This debate can have valid arguments on both sides but it is the debate worth having.

Congratulations Dana Ulman, I sincerely hope that your experience becomes a predominant experience for all of us. Until then, we do reserve our right to constructive criticism which the journal and the editor shouldn't belittle.

There is absolutely zero reason for something like Cureus to exist when there are plenty of alternatives who are properly indexed, have a respectable impact factor, and offer free publishing options. Cureus is just one of many journals that take advantage of people's desperation to publish.

Instead of accepting an open confrontation, carrying out your prejudicial inferences under a post isn't very scientific.

If he has evidence of this, I repeat, a scientist is required to write letters to the editor and report the fact to PubMed and Web of Science.

Complaining under a post without citing sources, among other things, makes this conversation devoid of any validity and scientificity.

Furthermore, although I have no personal relationship with the Cureus team, I invite you to take part in the confrontation to allow the accused to respond (as it should be in a democracy and, even more so, in the scientific field).

Samia Husain The fact that THIS thread comes up prominently in Google, despite whiney people who are providing no real evidence of malfeasance seems to indicate that there is no confirmed problems with this journal. If there were real problems, there would be some more solid evidence HERE as well as in other discussion groups. That said, science and evidence are always evolving subjects.

For the record, I was introduced to CUREUS by George Lundberg, MD, the former editor of JAMA (!) and former editor at Medscape. When I look at WHO is involved with this journal, I am impressed, even very impressed.

Daniel Lins https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(21)00899-0/fulltext

IF 60.392 (2019).

Your comment proves nothing. Provide a stat and let's talk about it.