In a recent Science editorial, Barbara Redman and our Ivan Oransky called for a boost to the budget and authority of the U.S. Office of Research Integrity (ORI). In this letter, a nephrologist and researcher suggests one potential way to fight fraud.
Bravo on your editorial, which pointed out the pathetic funding level for an agency that is supposed to put a check on self-interested fabrication and distortion in scientific research. Perhaps universities and influential individuals who feel the threat of censure have collaborated to minimize that risk by throttling the Office of Research Integrity (ORI). Regardless, billions of dollars each year are probably lost in misdirected efforts based on false information. That is a national tragedy.
During the time I was an undergraduate at Caltech we had an honor code that was very clear: You cheat, lie or fabricate and you are at best heavily censured, and likely out. We learned that one’s research notes were our reputation, and that our supervising senior researchers would often and unpredictably ask to review them. It was daunting and occasionally very stressful, but led to a lifelong ethic that stood me in good stead when I went into medicine, where peoples’ lives were at stake based on what we wrote and did.
One tool I used while working for the Veterans Administration (VA) could come in useful in the wider context of research. The VA has an electronic health record (EHR) called “CPRS” that is based on “write once/read many.” Every note and every prescription is encrypted and stored in a way that cannot be erased. You can enter a note amending an erroneous entry, but the original entry can never be erased. It uses a lot of memory but assures that if an audit is needed for any reason the original entry will be available for review. Perhaps having lab notes based on such a digital system would raise the bar to post-hoc alteration high enough to discourage at least that form of cheating.
Of course, where prestige, money and fame are concerned there is no way to totally stop cheating. But an un-erasable digital form of lab notebook might help to at least reduce fabrication and manipulation in a world where lying seems to have become an accepted form of behavior for altogether too many in science.
Following graduation from Caltech, TJ O’Neil spent 45 years in the Air Force and VA as a clinical nephrologist after completing a fellowship in the lab of Jay Stein at the University of Texas, San Antonio. He is currently developing a patient kidney disease education program and a dialysis safety device.
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