Duplicate (redundant) publication – refers to repeated publication of a manuscript when there is clear overlap with a previous manuscript already published. Such overlap is possible when there is distinct similarity in the basic assumptions underlying the research, the sample characterization, identity of patients, research methods, research findings or conclusions.
Salami publication- refers to splitting the research findings from a single study and dispersing them in different publications or at different times, with the intended purpose of increasing the number of publications.
Duplicate and salami publication harm and distort scientific truth and are therefore prohibited. The damage caused by such publications is substantial. Among the negative aspects, suffice it to mention the waste of resources caused by publication at the expense of other original articles, the waste of time of the reviewers and the creation of artificial information overload that is not for a worthy purpose. It is also important to mention that duplicate publication may result in biased medical knowledge in meta-analysis tests of evidence-based medicine.
Furthermore, such publications often involve legal problems relating to copyright theft. Above all, such studies enable erroneous academic promotion based on supposed “achievements”.
The authors shall declare that the manuscript submitted for publication is original and was not submitted simultaneously for publication to other journals, and that the relevant information has not already been published somewhere else.
Double or salami publication are permitted in the following cases:
- Wide scope epidemiological or clinical studies whose findings cannot be published at the same time or that address different research questions.
- The research was published beforehand as an abstract submitted to a scientific conference, provided the journal editor is aware of the previous publication.
- Duplicate publication in different languages aimed at different readers, provided the editor has been informed.