What conflicts of interests or financial disclosures are reported by physician guideline authors serving on guideline committees of the American Association of Ophthalmology (AAO) relative to payments reported by industry on the US Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Open Payments database?In this cross-sectional study, among 149 physician guideline authors who declared having no financial disclosures while serving on the AAO guideline committee, 81 physician authors (54.4%) had payments indicated by industry on the Open Payments database not reported within the guidelines.Discordance in disclosures of physician authors serving on AAO guideline committees should be evaluated to strive for accurate disclosures. This cross-sectional study assesses financial disclosures reported by physician authors of the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) Practice Pattern Guidelines compared with those reported by industry to evaluate the disclosures’ accuracy. Recommendations of clinical guidelines affect physicians’ care delivery. Potential bias and undeclared conflicts of interests (COIs) among guideline authors can impact clinical practice decisions.To assess financial disclosures reported by physician authors of the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) Practice Pattern Guidelines compared with those reported by industry to evaluate the disclosures’ accuracy.In this cross-sectional study, all clinical guidelines in the AAO Preferred Practice Patterns (PPP) since 2013 (first year with publicly available industry payment reports) were reviewed on May 1, 2022. Guideline physician authors’ name and their reported COI disclosure were extracted from the guideline publication. Payments to physician authors reported by industry were retrieved from the US Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Open Payments database. Physician authors serving on the AAO guideline committee were included.The primary outcome measure was the accuracy of authors’ COIs disclosure. Secondary outcome measures were payments to physician authors reported by industry, the types of payments, and authors’ gender.P = .003).A total of 24 AAO guidelines released between 2016 and 2020 were included. Per guideline, there was a mean (SD) of 7.83 (2.24) physician authors. After removing 14 nonphysician authors, 188 physician author names remained, including 83 names assigned as women (44.1%) and 105 names assigned as men (55.9%). Authors could be counted multiple times in these 188 names. According to the Open Payments database, industry reported that 112 of 188 physician authors (59.6%) had at least received 1 payment while serving on the guideline committee, with a payment mean (SD) of $29 849.35 ($54 131.56). According to AAO guidelines, 149 authors (79.3%) had no financial disclosures while serving on the guideline committee. Among these 149 authors, most authors (81 [54.4%]) had payments reported by industry on the Open Payments database not disclosed within the guideline reports. Women physicians were paid significantly more than men for total payments (median [IQR] payments, $15 265 [$598.47-$41 104.67] vs $301.48 [$218.85-$14 615.09]; difference, $14 963.52; Industry reported physician guideline authors to have received significant industry payments, some of which were not disclosed within information of the guidelines. To strengthen author transparency regarding these reported disclosures, the authors may want to review and resolve such potential discrepancies during the review and subsequent publication of guidelines. Some companies also need to report their physicians’ ownership and investment interests.3 To ensure transparency, the information is centralized on the US Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Open Payments database, a public website.4Rooted in evidence-based medicine, clinical practice guidelines (CPGs) use available scientific data to provide the latest recommendations with the goal of optimizing patient care.6 Readers should thus be aware of physician authors’ potential COIs. To our knowledge, the extent to which COIs systematically bias the field of ophthalmology by influencing society guidelines and the accuracy of COIs reported by authors of guidelines or reported by industry to have been given to those authors is unknown.Financial compensation can compromise medical research by skewing study outcomes and physicians’ clinical decisions.7 We further determined author gender  to evaluate potential differences in COIs.Considering this gap in the ophthalmology literature, we assessed payments reported by authors of the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) Practice Pattern Guidelines compared with payments reported by industry to have been given to these authors to evaluate the disclosures’ accuracy and authors’ compliance to the Council of Medical Specialty Societies’ Code for Interactions with Companies.8 and reviewed available industry payment data listed from the Open Payments database4 on May 1, 2022. The study period was determined based on publicly available industry payment data only being reported as of 2013. Indeed, the national policies mandating Open Payments were originally enacted in 2013 with the goal of collecting and publishing information about payments reporting entities made to covered recipients.9 This study was exempt from research ethics board review per Article 2.2 of the Tri-Council Policy Statement. The described research adhered to the tenets of the Declaration of Helsinki. This study followed the Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies in Epidemiology (STROBE) reporting guideline.All authors reviewed all clinical guidelines in the Preferred Practice Patterns (PPP) section of the AAO websiteTwo authors (A. X.-L. N. and M. J.-C.) retrieved guideline authors’ names and their reported COI disclosures on the guideline publication. Guideline authors only included guideline writers. Nonphysician guideline authors were excluded. We further documented if the authors were chairs or cochairs of the AAO subspecialty guidelines committee. The exact dates in which physician authors joined AAO’s guidelines committees were unknown. Physician authors were counted multiple times if they authored more than 1 AAO guideline.Three authors  entered eligible authors’ names into the Open Payments search tool and cross-matched their full name, role , medical specialty , and location to identify the correct individuals and extract their payment data matching the disclosure period indicated on the AAO guideline. Indeed, the AAO guidelines provide specific disclosure periods by indicating months and years. For example, if a guideline has a disclosure period from January to October 2019, we matched the same time period on Open Payments.9 One of us (A. X.-L. N.) determined physician authors’ gender  by inputting their first names into Gender API,10 which is an application program interface assigning gender with 98% accuracy.11Payment data were categorized into general payments, research payments, research funding, and ownerships. General payments are payments not associated with research studies, contrary to research payments. Examples of general payments include consulting and speaking fees, honoraria, gifts, and royalties not related to research studies. Associated research funding is defined as funding received for a research project where the physician is named as principal investigator. Ownership payments consist of the actual dollar amount invested and the value of the ownership or payment investment interest.P values were not adjusted for multiple analyses. P values less than .05 were considered statistically significant, and all P values were 2-tailed.Descriptive statistics were calculated using Stata/IC version 16.1 (StataCorp). The Kruskal-Wallis test by ranks was performed to test whether there was a significant difference in median total payments between men and women. A total of 24 guidelines released between 2016 and 2020 by the AAO were included. PPPs were divided into subspecialty , includiThere were 14 nonphysician author names, including 2 assigned as women and 12 assigned as men. These nonphysician authors wrote between 1 and 7 guidelines each and held one of the following degrees: CO, COMT, JD, MHS, MPH, PhD, or ScM. After excluding 14 nonphysician author names, 188 author names remained, including 83 assigned as women (44.1%) and 105 assigned as men (55.9%). These author names represented 66 different authors, as authors wrote between 1 and 8 guidelines each. According to the AAO guidelines, 149 guideline authors (79.3%) had no financial disclosures while serving on the AAO guideline committee.Among the 149 guideline authors who reported having no financial disclosures, 81 (54.4%) had payments reported by industry on the Open Payments database while serving on the AAO guideline committee. More specifically, guideline authors with no financial disclosures reported on the guidelines had the following payments reported by industry on the Open Payments Database during the AAO disclosure period: a median  of 5  payments and a mean (SD) of 8.2 (13.8) payments, totaling between $9.78 and $79 602.07 . A total of 16 guideline authors (19.8%) had payments of less than $100 reported by industry on the Open Payments database.According to the Open Payments database, 112 of 188 physician authors (59.6%) had been reported by industry to have received at least 1 payment while serving on the AAO guideline committee ; Figure.P = .003).As indicated in There was a total of 30 physician authors serving as chairs and cochairs in the AAO guidelines reviewed, with 6 guidelines cochaired by 2 physicians. A total of 6 of 30 chairs and cochairs (20%) reported financial disclosures in the AAO guidelines. Of these, 21 chairs and cochairs had financial disclosures reported by industry on the Open Payments database, with 1 to 115 payments  totaling $61.56 to $79 602.07 .5 The payments reported by industry to have been received by physician authors of AAO guidelines was substantial, with a median (IQR) of $691.17 ($218.85-$41 104.67) and a mean (SD) of $29 849.35 ($54 131.56), which is higher compared with industry payments received by clinical guideline physician authors in other medical specialties.14 All authors reviewed all AAO guidelines published from 2013 until May 2022, and 2 authors (A. X.-L. N. and M. J.-C.) extracted physician guideline authors’ COIs. Three authors  retrieved physician payments reported by industry using the Open Payments database.Some ophthalmologists are reported by industry to receive substantial payments from industry on the Open Payments database.15 However, more than half of physician authors (81 [54.4%]) who declared having no financial disclosures while serving on the AAO guideline committee had payments reported by industry on the Open Payments database. Studies in other medical specialties that examined physicians who authored clinical guidelines of leading specialty organizations similarly reported a disconnect between the COIs reported in the guidelines and those reported by industry in Open Payment systems.14 If truly representing errors, this disconnect between COIs reported in guidelines and in Open Payments may contribute to potential biases in guidelines of national medical organizations, including the AAO.2 Furthermore, the Institutes of Medicine Guidelines for trustworthy CPGs recommends that 50% or more authors on CPG committees have no COIs.16 While nominally all the AAO guidelines fit this criterion, our analyses show that 16 of 24 guidelines now fail and may be considered untrustworthy. Additionally, these best practice guidelines for CPGs recommend that committee chairs have no COIs, which is not the case in 6 of 30 chairs and cochairs based on the AAO guidelines’ own disclosures and in 21 of these same chairs and cochairs based on the information reported by industry on the Open Payments database.AAO’s policy statement stipulated that committee members must disclose all financial relationships with companies.P = .003). Our findings differ from prior studies reporting that women physicians were underrepresented in industry compensation and paid less in industry partnerships compared with men.18 Extended research should be conducted to understand these financial differences.Among the 112 physician authors who were reported by industry to have received at least 1 industry payment, women (54.5%) were more represented than men. Women physicians were reported by industry to have been paid significantly more than men for total payments  using Gender API. Gender API does not capture the spectrum of gender identities, which limits genders included in this study.Our study presents limitations. The first limitation is that we are using the Open Payments database. Therefore, we are relying on payments reported by industry, which do not necessarily indicate payments truly received by physicians. Indeed, Open Payments could have reporting errors from a company; some listings in Open Payments may have gone to a physician’s employer or a payment declined by a physician still could be reported in Open Payments system. Second, the SDs calculated for the payments reported to have been received indicate that the data are quite skewed, as they are 2-fold greater than the means. It is also not possible to fully assess ophthalmologist’s financial disclosures due to the limits of the Physician Payment Sunshine Act. The Sunshine Act only requires payment reporting of companies that sell products covered by government programs and that offer compensation worth more than $10.19Moving forward, AAO policies could be modified by reinforcing authors’ reviews of their disclosures with disclosures reported by industry on the Open Payments database. Increasing authors’ awareness and understanding of the AAO policy statement may also contribute to better declaration of COIs in clinical guidelines. It remains unclear if COI reporting alone is sufficient to mitigate industry influence on evidence-based guidelines.


The authors regret the omission of the funding acknowledgements in the original article. These acknowledgements are given here.This work was financially supported by the Key Research Program of Zhejiang Province (2021C02041 and 2021C02013), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (32201238), the “Sannongjiufang” Research Joint Project of Zhejiang Province in 2022 (2022SNJF059) and the “Sannongliufang” Research Joint Project of Zhejiang Province in 2021 (2021SNLF008).The Royal Society of Chemistry apologises for these errors and any consequent inconvenience to authors and readers.


The authors of the original article “Yanghe Huayan Decoction inhibit the capability of trans-endothelium and angiogenesis of HER2+ breast cancer via pAkt signaling” (DOI: 10.1042/BSR20181260) would like to correct After publication the authors identified that the data had been incorrectly calculated, the current result could not be generated from the raw data and that the title for the Histogram was incorrect.In addition, the following text from the first paragraph of the Results section: The data indicated that YHD significantly inhibited cells crossing through HUVEC-plated upper chamber by 61.15% , and the inhibition of combination was the most effective  .Should instead read: The data indicated that YHD significantly inhibited cells crossing through HUVEC-plated upper chamber by 56.70% , and the inhibition of combination was the most effective . However, there was no obvious difference of tans-endothelium capability between YHD and trastuzumab groups  .The requested correction has been assessed and agreed by the Editorial Board. The authors declare that these corrections do not change the results or conclusions of their paper.


M., Varela, S., Martínez Cortizas, A. M., & Fragoso, J. M. V. (2023). Mammal traits and soil biogeochemistry: Functional diversity relates to composition of soil organic matter. Ecology and Evolution, 13, e10392. sobral.bernal.mar@gmail.com” was incorrect. This should have read: “mar.sobral.bernal@usc.es”.In the correspondence data of the “Authors' list” section, the email address “We apologize for this error.


Retraction Note: Orphanet Journal of Rare Diseases (2022) 17:6410.1186/s13023-022-02221-zThe Editor-in-Chief has retracted this article after the authors discovered 14 data calculation errors in Table 1. The authors have been invited to submit a new manuscript for peer review. Kaiyue Hu disagrees with this retraction. None of the other authors has responded to correspondence from the Publisher about this retraction.


The present international eminence-based study, harmonizing diverse intercultural perspectives, highlighted the specific needs of older judo practitioners. The results of this study will contribute to the structure of a sound educational program for coaches of older judo practitioners to enhance the quality of older adults’ sports experiences by linking safety, enjoyment, social interactions, and learning principles.Judo coaches are urged to develop specific competencies and skills for addressing the special needs of older practitioners. Thus, the purpose of this study was to investigate the experts’ opinions on judo training in late adulthood to develop sound educational programs for coaches of older judo practitioners. Overall, eighty-eight experts from an international consortium of judo and educational partners participated in national focus groups. During the focus groups, experts discussed five themes and generated statements pertinent to educate coaches to support older judo practitioners . The initial list of 262 statements was synthesized, validated, analyzed, and organized into a final list of 55 statements and six macro-areas: aging process ( Healthy aging has become a high priority in contemporary society, also considering the relevant and continuous increase of the older adults’ share in the general population . Thus, tJudo  is a martial art and an Olympic combat sport, but more a means of education and a method of personal and social improvement through the execution of various techniques, according to its founder, the Japanese educator Jigoro Kano Sensei. Due to its inner characteristics stimulating coordination, dynamic balance, bone health, and mental control, judo has been considered particularly suitable for older people ,20,21,22https://academy.ijf.org/ (accessed on 19 July 2023)). To gain a comprehensive understanding of the benefits of judo in older adults and to assist coaches in effectively promoting judo training in healthy settings, the European Commission recently funded the “EDucating Judo Coaches for Older practitioners (EdJCO)” Project (622155-EPP-1-2020-1-IT-SPO-SCP) under the Erasmus+ Sport Programme [Coaches’ preparedness is a crucial component for structuring and monitoring safe and effective sports programs for older individuals . In thisrogramme ,29. The rogramme .Therefore, the purpose of the present eminence-based study was to explore experts’ perceptions regarding the knowledge and competencies that judo coaches should acquire to plan safe judo training for older individuals. In particular, the focus group methodology was deemed appropriate to explore the opinions of academic and judo experts on the necessary knowledge to be provided to coaches on the benefits, the risks, and the adapted judo methodologies for implementing effective and safe programs for novice and expert older judo practitioners . It was The present study was approved by the European Commission (622155-EPP-1-2020-1-IT-SPO-SCP) and the Institutional Review Board of the University of Rome Foro Italico (CAR73/2021). An ethnographic research approach was deemed appropriate to construct an international educational programme for judo coaches encompassing educational units and intelligible content according to the needs of coaches from different social and cultural settings . To gathWhat are the most relevant benefits judo coaches should be aware of when training former or novice older judo practitioners?What are the most relevant information judo coaches should be aware of when training novice older judo practitioners?What are the most relevant information judo coaches should be aware of to prevent/manage risks when training former or novice older judo practitioners?Which are the main criteria for defining judo training groups in relation to participants’ judo expertise, chronological/functional age, and/or sex?What are the most relevant tools/tests/measurements for monitoring training plans for former or novice older judo practitioners?Following the findings of a systematic literature review , the resOverall, this study met the eight criteria for qualitative excellence ,38: (1) According to the literature  and in aBetween May and October 2021, seven focus groups were organized in presence and online according to the current COVID-19 pandemic national-specific regulations in Croatia, Italy, Malta, Romania, Slovenia, Spain, and Türkiye. The common structure of the focus groups encompassed four phases, with an overall average duration of around 100 min . First, The statements recorded during each national focus group in relation to the five proposed open-ended questions have been recorded in the respective seven national languages. The translation guidelines encompassed a faithful preliminary translation of each statement into English, which was independently performed by two components of the research group from each country. Then, to ensure the accuracy of the English translation, an English reviewer was involved in a blind-back translation procedure. Thus, the final list of the English version of the statements in relation to the five open-ended questions was achieved. The procedures to analyze the collected data have been consistent with the original purpose of the study and the need to generate eminence-based knowledge in relation to the research questions for the identification of judo coaches’ educational needs in implementing training programs for older adults . To harmOverall, eighty-eight experts provided their written informed consent to volunteer for this study . The initial list of 262 statements was synthesized, validated, analyzed, and organized into a final list of 55 statements and six macro-areas and sub-groups . AccordiThe present study’s novelty lies in experts’ contribution to uncovering the relevant knowledge coaches need to acquire to coach safely and effectively older judo practitioners. According to the experts, aging processes , first aid , individual motor literacy and functional fitness, assessment tools, and evaluations, psychological , organizational  and technical  aspects emerged as the main needs of education of judo coaches. The conceptualization of essential contents for judo educational curricula is crucial for helping coaches understand the objectives of judo programs for older adults and the necessary knowledge of practitioners’ health, abilities, and potentials, and recognizing the problems older judo practitioners may encounter. This aspect is particularly relevant in considering that coaching education has almost exclusively focused on youth, adolescent, and young adult athletes . EngaginThe experts highlighted the necessity to raise the awareness of judo coaches on the aging process, which is characterized by pronounced differences between individuals due to a multi-factorial model where a natural devolution of physiological and functional abilities, high exposure to chronic diseases, and reduced active lifestyles mutually influence each other, resulting in a high incidence of chronic diseases and long-term consequences on health ,46. AccoAlthough exercise training is a recommended non-pharmacological treatment for individuals with hypertension and other coronary diseases, exercise modality elicits different effects during and after the training session, also in relation to the training status of the practitioner ,63,64,65In relation to safety and first aid aspects, during the focus groups, the experts specifically addressed the necessity to require a family medicine or a sports medicine certification that includes general health, cardio-pulmonary, metabolic, and musculoskeletal assessments. In countries where sports medicine certification is not mandatory, judo coaches could administer AAHPERD Council on Aging and Adult Development Medical/Exercise Assessment for Older Adults , which eIn this study, experts urged coaches to be aware of age-related dehydration, which could be due to physiological  and behavioral  factors. In fact, dehydration could negatively impact performance, cognitive functions, bronchoconstriction and related pathogenesis of certain pulmonary disorders, and vision ,82,83,84A thorough knowledge of the health status, previous injuries, and physical activity experience of every novice practitioner is crucial to adapt the judo training and techniques to the individual characteristics of the older judo practitioners and to ensure well-controlled interventions ,22,44. IIn this study, the experts emphasized the necessity of adopting strategies to increase older judo practitioners’ self-confidence through self-development-based goals and an enjoyable environment in the dojo, which could increase their mental and psychological health. In fact, multimodal physical activity interventions over long periods, high functional fitness, and activity engagement are considered effective preventive measures for mental disorders affecting more than 20% of middle-aged and older adults presenting relevant disturbances in thinking, emotional regulation, anxiety, behavior control, dementia, depression, and Alzheimer’s diseases ,102,103.The experts claimed that fears  and anxiety disorders could be potential obstacles for older practitioners to engage in judo training, and suggested that a practitioner-based approach rather than traditional and/or conventional training protocols should be adopted ,109,110.Regarding organizational and environmental aspects, during the focus groups, the expert emphasized the role of the family, friends, and group relationships in supporting the engagement in judo of older practitioners, as well as in decreasing the social isolation, loneliness, and depression, which increase with advancing age ,115. To According to the expert’s opinions, coaches have to apply specific strategies and methodologies to achieve positive outcomes  from an adapted judo training ,22,111. It is well known that falls account for the second leading cause of unintentional injury and deaths worldwide . TraininExperts also highlighted the necessity that coaches should guide practitioners with clear and simple communication to avoid deleterious misunderstandings that can generate incorrect or dangerous executions. Furthermore, to facilitate the learning of judo techniques while preserving the safety of the older practitioners, coaches are encouraged to use mats, exercise balls, balance boards, and resistance bands, also using background music, which could correspond to the requirements for the organization of learning and training processes in judo . AnotherThe present work was the first EU-funded collaborative partnership addressing the issues of educating coaches for older judo practitioners. In complementing the evidence-based knowledge on judo training in older practitioners, the present participatory approach provides multidisciplinary experts’ experiences and opinions to be considered in the construction of an educational program for judo coaches of older adults. To improve the usability and satisfaction of a sound educational program for the implementation of competencies of judo coaches with respect to older practitioners, a major limitation is still present. In fact, there is a need for further investigations to provide empirical validation of relevant necessary competencies coaches should possess when training older judo practitioners. Actually, structured and comprehensive education for coaches of individuals with advancing age is still limited . TherefoThe present international eminence-based study investigated the expert’s perspectives regarding the necessity of a tailored education for judo coaches of older practitioners, harmonizing diverse intercultural perspectives. The experts addressed the major needs of coaches’ education, including the most relevant age-related chronic diseases, psychological  and health  aspects that characterize the aging process, the needs of risk prevention and emergency action plans, the adapted techniques to meet the functional fitness and motor literacy of older practitioners, the evaluation tools, and the organisational  arrangements. In fact, the role of judo coaches is crucial when addressing the multifaced challenges of providing adequate training programs to a heterogenous older adult population . Thus, to apply a practitioner-based approach and promote active, healthy aging, a trustful and empathic relationship between judo coaches and practitioners is a milestone.To propose judo coaches as a user-friendly tool to facilitate a sound practitioner’s self-development program, our work introduces novel guidelines to promote judo lifelong learning for older people. Due to falls-related injuries, older people are facing disabilities and psychological diseases . In this respect, judo could prevent fall-related injuries by engaging older people in a person-centered approach to learning judo breakfall techniques . Thus, j


This is a peer review submitted for the paper "COVID-19 and Cybersecurity: Finally, an Opportunity to Disrupt?"The contribution “COVID-19 and Cybersecurity: Finally, an Opportunity to Disrupt?” [Unfortunately, the contribution is not in the general JMIR style, which needs to be checked by the editor.To summarize, there is nothing new in this article that has not been reflected in the general news media. Even for a Viewpoint, the technical references are completely missing. In the end, I do not see any value in this well-written but technically weak viewpoint.The authors present their viewpoint, but all points are more or less mainstream. What is the “new message,” what is different from all the others?Several points have technical backgrounds, which do not need to be described in a viewpoint article; however, the authors need to show that they are familiar with the literature in the mobile health cybersecurity domain. I do not see this point, and it needs strengthening.When it comes to contact tracing apps, the presentation is rather weak, and several questions or facts are not resolved . There are a lot of concepts in different countries for tracing apps; the authors do not describe these. In some countries, the reaction to a warning is left to the user, but what happens if larger groups disobey the warnings of tracing apps?One argument has not been presented, namely that the increased use of electronic equipment in social distancing times increases the cybersecurity attack surface.In the section on data sharing, the potential of false positives needs to be discussed, eg, technical limitations of distance estimations between different smartphone types should be critically reflected and a reference to this discussion should be given.The authors do not reflect on the general cybersecurity risks of implemented mobile health apps .There are some reflections on difficulties for tracing apps, but they are not backed by references.The title is very general, and the content does not fit the title; it needs to be less general and has to reflect that this is not a technical paper but a Viewpoint.This paper is improved, but I am not convinced about the content, which is noncomprehensive and not novel (which has been well explained by the authors). There is no typical research method behind it, such as a scoping review or similar, which may be the reason that I do not like it. In my opinion, the world does not need such a viewpoint paper, but the editors have to decide.


J Cell Mol Med. 2019; 23: 7709–7716. The above article, published online on 26 September 2019 on Wiley Online Library (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/jcmm.14644), has been retracted by agreement between the journal Editor‐in‐Chief, Stefan Constantinescu and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.Pu Li, Qiaoge Zhang and Hua Tang. The retraction has been agreed following an investigation based on allegations raised by a third party, indicating irregularities in figure panels for manuscripts in multiple journals. Irregularities and concerns were found in Figures 2D, 2E, 4C and 4D involving eight images in the article. The authors confirmed the errors. Raw data underlying these figure panels were no longer available and as a result, the journal cannot independently verify the conclusions of the article. The authors were contacted regarding the findings and the proposed retraction, but we did not receive a response.


The journal retracts the article “Validation of the CHA2DS2-VA Score  in Nonvalvular Atrial Fibrillation Patients: A Nationwide Population-Based Study” . Following publication, methodological and data interpretation concerns were brought to the attention of the Editorial Office.Adhering to our complaints procedure, an investigation was conducted by the Editorial Office and Editorial Board that confirmed the presence of a number of significant issues with the methods used and the analysis of the data and concluded that the overall findings of this study  could noJournal of Clinical Medicine. This retraction was approved by the Editor in Chief of the The authors agreed to this retraction.


The authors hypothesize that the phenotype may have been due to the variable nature of the filamentation assay.In addition, the authors have been unable to reproduce the finding that In light of these issues, the authors retract this article.All authors agreed with the retraction. We apologize that these issues were not identified before the article was published.


In the original publication , there wThere were two figure numbers that were writing mistakes in Sections 2.3 and 2.4. The authors have replaced “there was no alteration in the NaHS treatment group ” with “there was no alteration in the NaHS treatment group ” in Section 2.3. And the authors replaced “Figures 3J and 4H” with “Figures 3I and 4H” in Section 2.4.The authors apologize for any inconvenience caused and state that the scientific conclusions are unaffected. This correction was approved by the Academic Editor. The original article has been updated.


This article was published without appropriate declaration of competing interest or patient consent statements.The publisher apologizes for any inconvenience caused by this mistake. The relevant statements are provided below.Declaration of Competing InterestThe authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.Patient consentThe authors have written informed consent from the patient for the publication of this case report.


Retraction Note: J Exp Clin Cancer Res 37, 52 (2018)10.1186/s13046-018-0677-7The Editor-in-Chief has retracted this article. After publication, concerns were raised regarding highly similar images in the present figures, specifically:The Transwell assay images in Fig. 6e and f, and 7i appear to contain multiple overlapping panels;A number of images in Fig. 6e appear highly similar to those in Figs. 4d and 5d in the authors’ earlier article .Figure 7h middle panel p-Akt lanes 3 and 4 appear highly similar to Fig. 7k right panel N-Cad lanes 1 and 2.Figure 7h left and right panel b-actin blots appear highly similar to those in Fig. 7k, but the middle panel blots are different.Additionally, the study used Bel7402 and Bel/5-FU cell lines, which have both been reported to be HeLa derivatives. Therefore, these cells are not suitable models for hepatocellular carcinoma.The authors have provided the raw data from the Transwell, immunohistochemistry and western blot assays. However, further checks by the publisher found labelling errors in the original western blot data that may have affected the results and conclusions of the article. The Editor-in-Chief therefore no longer has confidence in the presented data.Corresponding Author Tao Tian has stated on behalf of all co-authors that they do not agree to this retraction.


More specifically, there was a printing mistake in . The corrected caption appears below: ‘Effects of administration of C. osmophloeum leaf extract, nanoemulsion and powder in hydrosol on fasting blood glucose (FBG), oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT) serum insulin and HOMA-IR index in high-fat diet with streptozotocin injection into diabetic rats’. The authors state that the scientific conclusions are unaffected. This correction was approved by the Academic Editor. The original publication has also been updated.In the original publication , there w


Sci., 2023, 14, 7221–7229, https://doi.org/10.1039/D3SC00849E.Correction for ‘Evidence for and evaluation of fluorine–tellurium chalcogen bonding’ by Robin Weiss  The authors regret that The Royal Society of Chemistry apologises for these errors and any consequent inconvenience to authors and readers.


Retraction to: Bai et al. Gut Pathog (2020) 12:2210.1186/s13099-020-00361-w.The editors have retracted this article. After publication, concerns were raised regarding similarities of western blots, fluorescence images and flow cytometry plots presented in Figs. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 9 with other papers that were either published earlier or under consideration within a similar time frame [The authors have confirmed that incorrect images were used in this article, and the raw data are no longer available.The editors therefore no longer have confidence in the presented data.None of the authors have responded to any correspondence from the editor or publisher about this retraction notice.


Retraction Note: BMC Cancer 18, 641 (2018)https://doi.org/10.1186/s12885-018-4559-3The Editor has retracted this article. After publication, concerns were raised about the apparent overlap between panels H1975/shNC and H1993/shNC in Fig. 2D. The authors sent raw data on request, where additional irregularities have been found, and the images for Fig. 2D were different. The authors did not provide a sufficient explanation of the irregularities. The Editor has, therefore, lost confidence in the integrity of the findings. Xue Hou, Haoxian Yang and Li Zhang agree to this retraction. The Editor has been unable to obtain the current email addresses for Run Gong, Jianhua Zhan, Ting Zhou, Yuxiang Ma, Yuanyuan Zhao, Yaxiong Zhang, Gang Chen, Zhonghan Zhang, Shuxiang Ma, Xi Chen, Fangfang Gao, Shaodong Hong, Fan Luo, Wenfeng Fang, Yunpeng Yang, Yan Huang, and Likun Chen.


Open Biol.5, 150126. (Published online 1 December 2015). (doi:10.1098/rsob.150126)Following the publication of ‘RNA editing of microRNA prevents RNA-induced silencing complex recognition of target mRNA’, the Editorial team have concerns regarding the validity of the data used in this study.We are issuing an expression of concern here and investigating this as a matter of urgency; we will notify readers as to the results of our investigation as soon as possible.


PNAS Nexus, Volume 2, Issue 5, May 2023, pgad132, https://doi.org/10.1093/pnasnexus/pgad132This is a correction to: Eva Vriens, Luca Tummolini, Giulia Andrighetto, Vaccine-hesitant people misperceive the social norm of vaccination, PNAS Nexus, it was discovered that this paper was missing a statement acknowledging compliance with the PNAS Nexus Human and Animal Participants and Clinical Trials policy:During a retroactive audit conducted by Ethical approval was obtained from the ethical board of the Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies of the Italian National Research Council (AMMCNT-CNR n. 0065527/2019). Participants in our studies were informed about the data collection, data storage, and their individual rights and provided informed consent before participating.This error has been corrected in the original article.


Open Med. (Wars) 2022 Dec 9;17(1):1949–1964. doi: 10.1515/med-2022-0584. PMID: 36561848; PMCID: PMC9743197, authors requested to replace In the published article Zhong Y, Zhang Z, Chen X. Inhibition of miR-21 improves pulmonary vascular responses in bronchopulmonary dysplasia by targeting the DDAH1/ADMA/NO pathway.


Vafaee et al., RSC Adv., 2021, 11, 22661–22676, https://doi.org/10.1039/D1RA02780H.Retraction of ‘Synthesis and characterization of AFe RSC Advances article due to concerns with the reliability of the data.The Royal Society of Chemistry, with the agreement of the authors, hereby wholly retracts this 1 a new concern has been identified with the published article. The XRD patterns in Fig. 2b and both the original Fig. 4a and b contain multiple overlapping sections. In addition, new information brought to the attention of the Editor undermines the integrity of the authors' original explanation, meaning that the Editor has lost confidence that the findings presented in this paper are reliable.Following the publication of a previous correction to replace the XRD patterns in Fig 4a and b,Omid Amiri, Mansour Jahangiri, and Masoud Salavati-Niasari wish to state that they had no role in preparing the XRD data.1 related to this article.This retraction supersedes the information provided in the correctionSigned: Fahimeh Vafaee, Samira Mandizadeh, Omid Amiri, Mansour Jahangiri, Masoud Salavati-NiasariDate: 24/7/2023RSC AdvancesRetraction endorsed by Laura Fisher, Executive Editor,


Adams, The Physiological Society and American Physiological Society, and John Wiley and Sons Ltd. The retraction has been agreed at the authors' request. Since publication, the authors have identified that the calculation of microcirculatory resistance does not require a correction factor. This invalidates several figures in the paper and the overall conclusions. The editors have no ethical concerns about the paper. The authors have prepared a Letter to the Editor (10.14814/phy2.15807) explaining, in detail, the error and their decision to retract the paper.The above article, published online on 10 March 2023 in Wiley Online Library ( Adams, The Physiological Society and American Physiological Society, and John Wiley and Sons Ltd. The retraction has been agreed at the authors' request. Since publication, the authors have identified that the calculation of microcirculatory resistance does not require a correction factor. This invalidates several figures in the paper and the overall conclusions. The editors have no ethical concerns about the paper. The authors have prepared a Letter to the Editor (10.14814/phy2.15807) explaining, in detail, the error and their decision to retract the paper.The above article, published online on 10 March 2023 in Wiley Online Library (


Retraction Note: Journal of Hematology & Oncology (2020) 13:24 10.1186/s13045-020-00857-7The Editor-in-Chief has retracted this article. After publication, concerns were raised about image reuse in the article. Specifically:The top-left panel of Fig. 2F was reproduced in two panels of Fig. 4H, and in Fig. S11E of the supplementary materials.There is overlap between the top-left panel of Fig. 2G and the second-from-top-right panel of Fig. 4I.There is overlap between the top-left panel of Fig. 4I and the bottom-left panel of Fig. 5G.There is overlap between the second-from-bottom-left panel of Fig. 4I and the top-right panel of Fig. 5G.There is overlap between the bottom middle panel of Fig. 5G and the bottom-right panel of Fig. S7B of the supplementary materials.Additionally, the top-left panel of Fig. 2F was found to have previously been published in  by some Qiangsong Tong has stated on behalf of all authors that they do not agree to this retraction.


Food Science & Nutrition. https://doi.org/10.1002/fsn3.3006. The above article from Food Science & Nutrition, published online on 17 August 2022 in Wiley Online Library (https://wileyonlinelibrary.com), has been retracted by agreement between the journal's editor‐in‐chief, Y. Martin Lo, and Wiley Periodicals LLC. This action has been agreed upon due to image manipulation in Figures 1 and 4. As a result, the findings of this manuscript are considered unreliable. The editorial office did not receive responses from the authors or the institute.Retraction: Kou, Y., Zhu, R., Sun, Q., Li, Z., Feng, X., & Xu, H. (2022). Connexin 43 upregulation by dioscin‐inhibited gastric cancer metastasis by suppressing PI3K/Akt pathway.


Food Science & Nutrition, 2022 (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/fsn3.3107). The above article, published online on October 20, 2022 in Wiley Online Library (https://wileyonlinelibrary.com), has been retracted by agreement between the authors, the journal Editor in Chief Y. Martin Lo, and Wiley Periodicals LLC. The retraction has been agreed due to an error in which the incorrect manuscript was sent to the production team and published instead of the manuscript that the journal had reviewed and accepted.Effects of major ingredients  levels on physiochemical, rheological, and sensory attributes of walnut spread,


Retraction Note : Clinical Epigenetics (2019) 11:173 10.1186/s13148-019-0763-5The Editors-in-Chief have retracted this article. After publication, concerns were raised regarding image similarities in the western blot and invasion assay data presented in the figures. Specifically:Fig. 5a H3K27me3 GL1 lanes 2 and 3 appear highly similar.Fig. 5b H3K27me3 lane 1 appears highly similar to lane 5.Fig. 7a and 9a appear to share the same beta-actin control blot.Fig. 9b U-87 MC4040 and MC4041 images appear to originate from the same sample, although the stated treatments are different.The authors have stated that the overlapping images in Fig. 9b were included by mistake. They have also provided partial raw data to address the western blot concerns; however, further checks by the Publisher have found that a number of western blot images presented in the article don't accurately represent the original data. The Editors-in-Chief therefore no longer have confidence in the presented data.Susanna Scarpa does not agree to this retraction. Giulia Stazi, Rossella Fioravanti, Manuela Sabatino, Rino Ragno, Samanta Taurone, Marcella Nebbioso, Raffaella Carletti, Marco Artico, Sergio Valente and Antonello Mai have not responded to any correspondence from the publisher about this retraction. The publisher has not been able to obtain current email addresses for Ludovica Taglieri, Alice Nicolai, Annalisa Romanelli and Stefania Morrone.


Corrigendum to: IC50: an unsuitable measure for large-sized prostate cancer spheroids in drug sensitivity evaluation .This corrigendum corrects the authorship information to: Yipeng Xu, Gabriela Pachnikova, He Wang, Yaoyao Wu, Dorothea Przybilla, Zihao Chen, Shaoxing Zhu, Ulrich Keilholz. At the request of Dr. Reinhold Schäfer and with the agreement of all authors, Dr. Reinhold Schäfer is excluded from the list of authors. Dr. Schäfer expresses no doubts about the article's results and conclusion but was erroneously included on the list of authors.The authors sincerely apologize for the error and confirm that this correction does not change the conclusion of the article.


Retraction Note: Lipids in Health and Disease15, 172 (2016)10.1186/s12944-016-0332-2The authors have retracted this article. After publication, concerns were raised regarding the western blot data in Fig. 4a. The authors have checked the original images and found duplication and labelling issues in the raw data. As the full-length gel images are no longer available, the authors are unable to verify the data and the reliability of the presented results.All authors agree to this retraction.


This publication was supported by the Cooperative Agreement Number 5 NU36OE000007-03, funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.In the publication “Early Refill of an Opioid Medication: Recognizing Personal Biases Through Clinical Vignettes and OSCEs,” the following sentence should be added to the Funding/Support field:Additionally, the following field should be added:The contents of this publication are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention or the Department of Health and Human Services.


Nucleic Acids Research, Volume 32, Issue 16, 15 August 2004, Pages 4893–4902, https://doi.org/10.1093/nar/gkh820The Editors were alerted in November 2022 that the JAR (c) and HeLa pLuc705 (c) panels depicted in Figure 5B show unusual levels of similarity.The experiments were conducted 20 years ago, and the authors no longer have the original data. The authors have retrieved and examined the submitted graphic files and agree that the two panels do indeed look very similar. The authors have provided an earlier figure, shown below, that was generated at a similar time from a replicate experiment. This figure confirms the results, namely that no significant fluorescence signal (cellular uptake) is observed for either cell type without Lipofectamine (LFA).The authors conclude that the same image must have inadvertently been inserted twice at revision.This error does not affect the results or conclusion of the article.


Sci., 2023, 14, 2336–2341, https://doi.org/10.1039/D2SC06553C.Correction for ‘Abiotic microcompartments form when neighbouring droplets fuse: an electrochemiluminescence investigation’ by Silvia Voci  The authors regret that their source of funding was not acknowledged in their paper. The authors acknowledge funding for this work from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences under Grant R35-GM138133.The Royal Society of Chemistry apologises for these errors and any consequent inconvenience to authors and readers.


Ab initio study of the electronic states of V3Si in momentum space’ by Saloni Sharma et al., RSC Adv., 2023, 13, 25836–25845, https://doi.org/10.1039/D3RA04535H.Correction for ‘ The authors regret that there was an error in eqn (7). The correct equation is as shown below:The Royal Society of Chemistry apologises for these errors and any consequent inconvenience to authors and readers.


The authors would like to make the following corrections about the published paper . The cha8]s was written instead of the correct UD [(0°/90°)4]s. The corrected In Figure 11. Photomicrograph of a longitudinal section of a multi-scale structured contour joint with an inner [(±70°)5] bandage. Photomicrograph provided by Fraunhofer IWU.Figure 12. Photomicrograph of a cross-section of a meso-structured contour joint without a [(±70°)5] bandage. Photomicrograph provided by Fraunhofer IWU.There was a mistake in the captions for Figures 11 and 12. The use of externally provided images by Fraunhofer IWU was not mentioned. The correct figure captions appear below.Acknowledgments: The authors gratefully acknowledge the provision of photomicrograph images of the contour joint by Raik Grützner of the Fraunhofer Institute for Machine Tools and Forming Technology IWU.Raik Grützner (Fraunhofer Institute for Machine Tools and Forming Technology IWU) was not included as an author in the original publication. The added acknowledgements section appears here.The authors apologize for any inconvenience caused and state that the scientific conclusions are unaffected. The above corrections were approved by the Academic Editor. The original publication has also been updated.


Retraction Note : Stem Cell Research & Therapy (2020) 11:204 10.1186/s13287-020-01705-8The authors have retracted this article. While trying to replicate this study they found that the polydatin could not recover the mRNA and protein expression of RUNX2, Osteopontin, DLX5, and OCN after lentivirus transfection. The authors believe that this could be due to contamination of lentivirus or the vector, or that polydatin was wrongly prepared in this study. All authors agree to this retraction.


In “Technology-Assisted Cognitive Motor Dual-Task Rehabilitation in Chronic Age-Related Conditions: Systematic Review”  the authors noted one error:Affiliation of author Lorena Rossi:“Scientific Direction, Istituto Nazionale Riposo e Cura Per Anziani, Istituto di Ricovero e Cura a Carattere Scientifico, Ancona, Italy”has been replaced by:“Scientific Direction, IRCCS INRCA, Ancona, Italy”.The correction will appear in the online version of the paper on the JMIR Publications website on September 26, 2023, together with the publication of this correction notice. Because this was made after submission to PubMed, PubMed Central, and other full-text repositories, the corrected article has also been resubmitted to those repositories.


This is a peer-review report submitted for the paper “COVID-19 Outcomes and Genomic Characterization of SARS-CoV-2 Isolated From Veterans in New England States: Retrospective Analysis.”The authors presented a study  about th1. Line 85: Authors wrote, “we recorded hospitalization status, mortality, and oxygen (O2)-requirement within 24 hours of admission.” Here, can authors clarify if they recorded each single patient’s clinical information within 24 hours of admission or they collected them from chart review? In addition, for O2, the 2 should be subscript.2. Lines 105 and 106: The disease name should be capitalized.3. Line 113: Authors did not provide a transition between the univariate regression and multivariate regression. Univariate analysis was simply mentioned in the first sentence without any explanation or discussion. Authors should indicate the reason why they conducted multivariate analysis . Additionally, in general, the factors should have the first letter capitalized, for example, Age, Non-White Race.4. Line 129: Authors wrote, “our study found that in an older cohort of veterans.” Here, older cohort could cause some confusion to some readers. When one reads the paper a few years later, he or she probably cannot understand what the older cohort is related to. Authors can add a time frame to it.5. Line 131: Similar to point 4, authors should add the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report date.6. Line 133: Authors wrote, “veterans are a unique cohort because of advanced age on average, and more comorbidities. Understanding clinical factors that impact outcomes in veterans will help clinicians risk-stratify patients with similar demographic profiles.” Many veterans could be young in some Veterans Affairs (VA) medical centers. It may be right to general veteran populations, but authors need to cite references to support this claim.7. Line 137: Authors wrote, “in our study, age was a significant predictor for all of our outcomes and was a confounder for other variables.” Most scientific papers are written from the third point of view. Therefore, it is not common to state the study outcomes as “our outcome.” Authors should use a better phrase, such as in line 151: “This may explain the outcomes in our study.”8. Line 138: Authors wrote, “interestingly, LTC status predicted all three of our outcomes on univariate analysis, but not on multivariate analyses. Earlier in the COVID-19 pandemic, residents of nursing homes had higher rates of infection as well as severe illness and mortality .” There 9. Line 140: Authors wrote that “our study shows that among veterans in LTC facility, disease outcomes were not impacted by their residence status.” Here, authors should provide some discussion or reasons for their findings.10. Line 148: Authors wrote, “our study supports data from previous reports that non-White patients are at increased risk of hospitalization but have similar peak severity and mortality outcomes -6.” Are 11. Line 156: Authors concluded that, for patients with dementia, they could have a high risk of death because of biological factors. Another possibility is the lack of self-report ability in patients with dementia. As a result, they probably do not understand their body’s changes, which could delay the needed care.12. For the Discussion section, authors may add subtitles to different issues they would like to discuss. The current writing may be a little bit confusing to some readers.13. In the Discussion, the authors mentioned multivariate analysis of many potential risk factors as their strength. It is true that the multivariate model is a powerful tool, but it is not necessarily fit for the COVID-19 situation very well. Authors need to cite references about other cases of using the multivariate model for COVID-19 outcome analysis.14. Figures and supplemental tables: Authors should include more details in the titles. Simply writing “genomes” or “hospitalization” in the title is not standard in scientific papers.15. Figure 1: Authors should provide a better maximum likelihood tree. The current figure has many branches stacked to each other, barely providing any helpful information to readers.The authors presented an updated manuscript after taking the reviewers’ suggestions. I have a few minor comments.1. Authors added reference  but did 2. Authors wrote, “this study included all veterans who tested positive for COVID-19 from April 8, 2020, to September 16, 2020 at one of the six New England VA hospitals.” Previously authors wrote, “Connecticut had been entrusted with testing for SARS-CoV-2 for all six VA healthcare centers.” Does this mean the patients enrolled in this study are from one of six VA hospitals, or they are from all six hospitals?3. Authors wrote, “the CDC provides a list of chronic medical conditions (May 2021) that predispose individuals to severe illness from SARS-CoV-2 infection , but >754. In the Abstract, the authors wrote “Multiple SARS-CoV-2 lineages were distributed in patients in New England early in the COVID-19 era, mostly related to viruses from New York with D614G mutation.” Can the authors kindly clarify if it is New York State or New York City?


Antihypertensive drugs have been of significant interest to the pharmaceutical industry due to increasing sales opportunities in a global market. The financial relationships between pharmaceutical companies and the Japanese Society of Hypertension (JSH) have a possible influence on clinical practices in Japan. This study examined the distribution of pharmaceutical payments made to the authors of the revised Guidelines for the Management of Hypertension (JSH2019) and the transparency of the Conflict of Interest disclosure that each author made.We retrospectively obtained publicly available data regarding payments made by Japanese pharmaceutical companies to all authors of the JSH2019 in 2016. We also collected data on individual financial disclosure of JSH2019 authors to investigate whether their self-reported financial relationship with companies were compliant to the financial disclosure policy of JSH2019.The total and mean payment values reported by pharmaceutical companies were $4,246,436 and $21,447, respectively. Of the 198 authors, 171 (86.4%) authors received at least 1 payment. Of 74 authors required to disclose their conflict of interest (COI) the authors, one-third failed to follow the COI policy covering the clinical guidelines.Major pharmaceutical companies selling antihypertensive drug products in the Japanese market had a significant financial connection with the JSH2019 authors. Financial relationships between pharmaceutical companies and authors or Japanese medical societies are raising significant concerns about the credibility of clinical guidelines and the potentially biases and undue influences that they may cause, especially with respect to adverse prescription patterns. However, the scope of antihypertensive treatment in the Japanese population has not been fully investigated, which raises concerns about possible unwarranted pharmaceutical industry influences.Antihypertensive drugs are attractive targets for the pharmaceutical industry due to their high income-generating potential. In April 2019, the Japanese Society of Hypertension (JSH) published a set of revised Guidelines for the Management of Hypertension (JSH2019).,3 Therefore, the general principal of hypertension management is to choose any or the most appropriate or available drug, unless the patient has a specific clinical reason otherwise, such as contraindication or pregnancy. Furthermore, observations suggest that reduction in cardiovascular risk is also independent of the drug choice, being due simply to the amount of blood pressure reduction.,5 In response to this, pharmaceutical companies manufacture a variety of antihypertensive drugs meaning there is a wide variety of quite similar drugs competing in the market. In such a competitive market, the marketing and promotional activities of pharmaceutical companies are almost certain to be tightly focused on those individuals who have a major influence on prescription policies and behavior. Considering the extensive recent clinical trial misconduct of Valsartan, an ARB manufactured by Novartis, involving JSH members and their still unchanged financial tie with pharmaceutical companies after the scandal, the authors of clinical practice guidelines (CPGs) should be completely transparent about any potential conflicts of interest (COIs), especially with respect to links with the pharmaceutical industry. We consequently investigated the extent and characteristics of financial COIs declared by the JSH2019 authors.Today, the first-line antihypertensive drugs used in practice comprise 4 main classes: angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors, angiotensin II receptor blockers (ARBs), thiazide diuretics, and calcium channel blockers (CCBs). Both the ACC (AHA2017 guidelines) and JSH2019, mention that there are no significant differences in the effect and safety of antihypertensive drugs in each class in lowering blood pressure among 30% to 50% of patients.2 These payments are usually counted as incomes of the authors, not as research funding or other donations. We also collected relevant data, including names, affiliations, positions of the authors from their affiliations’ and other websites. Japanese yen were converted to United States of America dollars using the 2016 average monthly exchange rate of 108.8 yen per 1 US dollar.The 78 pharmaceutical companies belonging to the Japanese Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association (JPMA) disclose data of payments that they make to all Japanese healthcare professionals as required under the voluntary Transparency Guideline for the Relation between Corporate Activities and Medical Institutions, which governs all JPMA member companies. We obtained data on payments made by JPMA member companies for lecturing, writing, and consulting to all JSH authors in 2016 using methods as previously described.We evaluated the accuracy of the financial COIs reported by the authors, by comparing them with the payments disclosed by the pharmaceutical companies; the JSH2019 has a COI disclosure section requiring named authors provide mandatory details of any monies received, in excess of ¥500,000 ($4596), from any pharmaceutical company for lecturing or writing work. Payments for consulting were excluded in this analysis as they were not covered in the JSH2019 COI disclosure requirements. Institutional ethical committee approval was obtained from the Committee on the Medical Governance Research Institute, Minato-ku, Tokyo, Japan. Informed consent from the JSH2019 authors was not obtained as the payment data included in this study was collected from the publicly available data disclosed on the official homepage of each pharmaceutical company.3The JSH2019 had 198 authors: 146 (73.7%) were employees at universities or university hospitals and 92 (46.5%) were university professors. Payments totalled $4,246,436  in 2018.,10–15 This damages the credibility and trustworthiness of the JSH2019, especially as the update is advantageous for the pharmaceutical industry. Clearly, it is imperative that author COI disclosure policies need to be both clarified and rigorously enforced. Further, all authors need to comply and guideline publishers have to take responsibility to ensure that all requirements have been met in full and that all necessary details are published accurately.Notably, a third of JSH2019 authors clearly failed to comply with COI regulations, despite serious misconduct in Japan that led to the 2018 rigid enforcement of the Clinical Trials Act by Japan's Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare. Comparably, the previous investigation regarding pharmaceutical payment received by Japanese CPG authors also documented that under-reported and imprecise FCOI were found in profound number of authors.,10–15 As a countermeasure, the recruitment of CPG authors should be revised. It is true that a balanced compilation of CPG authors requires healthcare professionals, namely physicians, with abundant clinical experience and knowledge about the latest evidence in any specific medical field. However, it is to be noted that Japanese physicians mainly receive payments from pharmaceutical companies by serving as lecturers and often leave their own hospitals and travel throughout the country. In this regard, it is questionable how familiar these physicians are with current frontline clinical practice.As explained above, financial ties between the CPG authors and pharmaceutical companies are prevalent and still ongoing issue surrounding clinical practice in Japan.Limitations in our study include potential payment underestimates due to lack of information regarding research funding, donations, travel fees, meals, and other gifts, while payments from the medical device industry could not be included. Further, our manual handling of large volume payments data may have produced some errors in estimation of individual payment values.5In conclusion, we demonstrated significant financial relationships between pharmaceutical industry and the authors of JSH2019 even after the unprecedented misconduct related to antihypertensive drugs. Given the long-standing ties between the pharmaceutical industry and Japanese medical societies, significant concerns exist about the ethical and potentially corrupt nature of these relationships, which could cause biased and potentially harmful prescription patterns, as well as increased health care costs that could threaten the sustainability of Japan's globally-acclaimed universal health coverage and world-leading health care system.Conceptualization: Akihiko Ozaki, Tetsuya Tanimoto.Data curation: Hiroaki Saito.Formal analysis: Yuki Senoo, Hiroaki Saito, Toyoaki Sawano.Investigation: Hiroaki Saito, Akihiko Ozaki, Toyoaki Sawano.Supervision: Tetsuya Tanimoto.Visualization: Yousuke Suzuki, Tetsuya Tanimoto.Writing – original draft: Yuki Senoo, Akihiko Ozaki.Writing – review & editing: Yuki Senoo, Hiroaki Saito, Akihiko Ozaki, Toyoaki Sawano, Yuki Shimada, Kana Yamamoto, Yousuke Suzuki, Tetsuya Tanimoto.


Tu M, Jia HX and Liu HP performed the experiments. Wang XJ and Wang Y analyzed the data. Wang YB and Jiang N contributed analysis tools. Lu CY provided critical inputs on design, analysis, and interpretation of the study. All the authors had access to the data. All authors read and approved the final manuscript as submitted.


They also apologize to the readership for any inconvenience caused.The authors were able to re-examine their original data files, and realize how the errors were made during the assembly of this figure. The revised version of