Scientific misconduct in infectious diseases - European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases (ESCMID) survey.

We aimed to evaluate the prevalence and perception of scientific misconduct in infectious diseases (ID) and clinical microbiology (CM), as reported by the ID/CM community. An anonymous online ESCMID survey circulated among society members between October 2023 and June 2024; the questionnaire included data on participants' view on their own and their colleagues' scientific misconduct in the last 5 years. The survey received 220 responses. Responders were 73% ID physicians, 52% men, 56% age 35-54 years, and represented 48 countries, mainly European (126 participants). The vast majority of participants (78%) reported they did not personally commit scientific misconduct, while 54% reported witnessing misconduct by colleagues in their field. The most commonly committed misconduct by both responders and their colleagues was misconduct of authorship rules, 14% and 41%, respectively. Overall, 18% reported witnessing misleading reporting and 14% reported witnessing non accurate reporting of conflict of interest. Nevertheless, the majority (>60%) of responders reported high confidence in the integrity of published work in the field of ID/CM. Approximately one third of responders were not aware of the ESCMID ethics advisory committee as an authority to which members can report misconduct. Scientific misconduct, mostly related to violation of authorship rules, seems to be common in ID/CM. Efforts to improve scientific integrity should be made in order to keep trust in the scientific process.

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Copyright © 2024 European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Déclaration de conflit d'intérêts

Conflict of interest All authors declare none