Case Report Authorship Disagreement

[turnitblue&blue92]

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Hello. I am wondering if I accidentally burned my bridges here.

During my IM rotation, I wrote a case report ( I think I did most of the work) with one of the 1st year residents. The goal was eventual publication in a journal. I asked the resident if I could present the work at a local medical conference. Seeing that the resident had no desire to present, he told me that I could go ahead and do it. I wrote an abstract and gave it to the PD to review and she said that I should be the first author since I wrote the whole thing.
About a month and a half later the resident asks me if I submitted the abstract and asks for a personal copy. He then sends my abstract to the school affiliated "resident research night" with himself as the first author and me as the second author. I knew that he did this, but it wasn't worth going to the higher-ups at the time....especially since I didn't know if my submission would get accepted at the conference.
Last week I found out that my submission got accepted to the local conference. I informed the resident and started on the poster with his guidance. Today, he told me that the same poster/case shouldn't be presented at two conferences by two different first authors. He then told me that since only he can present at the resident research night conference, I should change the submission to the other conference(more prestigious) to make him the first author.
I felt uncomfortable saying no to him without back up, so I spoke to the hospital's medical student education director, regarding what I should do in this situation. And she told me that I was in the right and that she would speak to the resident and the coordinators for the resident research night. I did not speak to the PD since she is off this week.

Does anyone think I will be blackballed since I raised this issue? The PD is supposed to be writing one of my letters of rec.

 

[deleted480308]

Hello. I am wondering if I accidentally burned my bridges here.

During my IM rotation, I wrote a case report ( I think I did most of the work) with one of the 1st year residents. The goal was eventual publication in a journal. I asked the resident if I could present the work at a local medical conference. Seeing that the resident had no desire to present, he told me that I could go ahead and do it. I wrote an abstract and gave it to the PD to review and she said that I should be the first author since I wrote the whole thing.
About a month and a half later the resident asks me if I submitted the abstract and asks for a personal copy. He then sends my abstract to the school affiliated "resident research night" with himself as the first author and me as the second author. I knew that he did this, but it wasn't worth going to the higher-ups at the time....especially since I didn't know if my submission would get accepted at the conference.
Last week I found out that my submission got accepted to the local conference. I informed the resident and started on the poster with his guidance. Today, he told me that the same poster/case shouldn't be presented at two conferences by two different first authors. He then told me that since only he can present at the resident research night conference, I should change the submission to the other conference(more prestigious) to make him the first author.
I felt uncomfortable saying no to him without back up, so I spoke to the hospital's medical student education director, regarding what I should do in this situation. And she told me that I was in the right and that she would speak to the resident and the coordinators for the resident research night. I did not speak to the PD since she is off this week.

Does anyone think I will be blackballed since I raised this issue? The PD is supposed to be writing one of my letters of rec.

Admin will likely back you, the resident will hate you....

 

[austintr]

I don't think it's very likely that you'll get blackballed. The PD should ideally understand that you did the legwork and all that. Depending on how much the program values research though, I suppose she COULD side with the resident...but in that case, if you're not geographically limited/dead set on this program, who cares if they blackball you? You probably don't want to be part of a program that screws over medical students anyway. If you really, really want to match there, it would be a good idea to talk directly to the PD and resident (preferably at the same time) and get all this aired out.

Disclaimer: I'm just a first year and am speaking solely from professional experience, not a rotating student/matching expert's standpoint.

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

This is why I have a rule to just determine who the first author will be before we even do the project.

 

[Moose A Moose]

Defer to your senior... unless you have absolutely no interest in that internal medicine program.

 

[Goro]

Admin will likely back you, the resident will hate you....

I agree. You've made an enemy, so document everything and have your allies lined up.

 

[Dwan]

Hello. I am wondering if I accidentally burned my bridges here.

During my IM rotation, I wrote a case report ( I think I did most of the work) with one of the 1st year residents. The goal was eventual publication in a journal. I asked the resident if I could present the work at a local medical conference. Seeing that the resident had no desire to present, he told me that I could go ahead and do it. I wrote an abstract and gave it to the PD to review and she said that I should be the first author since I wrote the whole thing.
About a month and a half later the resident asks me if I submitted the abstract and asks for a personal copy. He then sends my abstract to the school affiliated "resident research night" with himself as the first author and me as the second author. I knew that he did this, but it wasn't worth going to the higher-ups at the time....especially since I didn't know if my submission would get accepted at the conference.
Last week I found out that my submission got accepted to the local conference. I informed the resident and started on the poster with his guidance. Today, he told me that the same poster/case shouldn't be presented at two conferences by two different first authors. He then told me that since only he can present at the resident research night conference, I should change the submission to the other conference(more prestigious) to make him the first author.
I felt uncomfortable saying no to him without back up, so I spoke to the hospital's medical student education director, regarding what I should do in this situation. And she told me that I was in the right and that she would speak to the resident and the coordinators for the resident research night. I did not speak to the PD since she is off this week.

Does anyone think I will be blackballed since I raised this issue? The PD is supposed to be writing one of my letters of rec.

You did the right thing. The resident should not be taking credit for your work, especially without permission. Who cares if that resident hates you, they were taking advantage of you with their seniority.

 

[IslandStyle808]

This is why I have a rule to just determine who the first author will be before we even do the project.

This is exactly what you do when you start a project! And the sad part is students in all levels of education have zero clue that they can do this.

I don't know how many years I've stated to members to take a research ethics class because they actually teach you how to mitigate through the waters of publication. Unfortunately this message is drowned out by PIs who think its taboo to talk about publication or authorship. This is what leads to all kinds of conflicts when the project is done.

Make sure to establish who the major players are from the MVP to the person who contributed the least BEFORE THE PROJECT STARTS!!!

When I had my first publication, I made sure I documented by email conversation with my PI who were the authors of the project. Although, it didn't stop him from adding an extra author, but I sure as hell made sure I maintained my first authorship!

 

[Anti-PD1]

There's a couple of residents who do salami science type stuff at my hospital. I did a project with them, doing 95% of the work. Project got accepted at a prestigious conference for an oral presentation, and we submitted it to a journal. We agreed he would present, and I would be first author on the paper.

I didn't work with them again, not worth the time or effort.

Over time, I've learned to keep my research collaborators to the absolute bare minimum. No extra fat, no extra emails and 'reviews', just the people essential to the study.

You're fine OP.