not included as an author on published abstract or poster presentation?

[goddammitimanauthor]

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hi,

throwaway for obvious reasons. username relevant.

im a m4 working on my eras. i worked on a research project in m2/m3 and just finished it up since the residents i was working with graduated. i contributed quite a bit to this project. i did a lit review, ran experiments (this was study with human subjects), and did stats analysis. the project was presented at a conference which i didnt attend because of my m3 schedule. since i didnt have the info needed to include the presentation in eras, i googled to find it. in the course of that googling, i found two things. first, on the official conference program, i was not listed as an author on the poster. second, an abstract for this project was published in a journal. re: the poster presentation, i was told that my name would be included on the poster and that i "should include it on my cv." i was never told that an abstract was being submitted, but this doesnt surprise me. i am surprised i was not told about it after it was accepted.

needless to say, im a little pissed. first, the abstract includes verbatim a portion of the intro/background i wrote after the lit review. based on that alone i think i have a rightful claim to be listed as an author. second, im not sure that i even feel comfortable listing the poster on my eras - irrespective of whatever may or may not have been on the poster, the last thing i want is an overzealous application reviewer to look up the conference program and see that im not actually an author as listed on the program. it just isnt worth including for that risk (or maybe im overblowing it, i dont know).

the poster presentation doesnt bother me too much. whatever. however the abstract does and imo that is completely unacceptable. not even because i want to run up the score on my cv, but because i want to be able to show that something was produced at the end of this project. saying that i just worked on a project with nothing to point to is unimpressive. i think being able to include a poster presentation and abstract pub will give the project some weight. the abstract has already in published.

so, what should i do? im going into a different field than the residents i worked with but i still like to think of myself as a nice guy and dont want to be overtly confrontational. the attending who is listed as the pi is someone that i know and have a good relationship with. i feel comfortable bringing it up with her but am not sure if thats what i should do. im holding back because even if i made a fuss i dont think anything would be corrected prior to my eras being submitted. i dont even know what could be done. i certainly dont want to **** with these residents (now fellows/attendings) over what ultimately amounts to unimportant bull****. but... what the hell man

thanks

 

[NickNaylor]

Wow, that sucks. If you have a bunch of other research experiences, it may not be worth pursuing this any further; as you mention, you'll probably ruffle a lot of feathers for what might be little or no actual gain on your part beyond some righting of the moral arc of the universe. If it's your only research experience, though, it might be worth exploring depending upon the actual research, its relevance to your specialty, etc..

That's a tough one. Good luck.

 

[Kahreek]

If they have your stuff in their publication, it is unacceptable.
I would point that out in a letter, politely. Stating no grudges, but telling that you find that it would be correct to co-author you.
It could not mean much, they will probably do nothing. Don't antagonize them, don't sue them.
But they will think twice, and should they cross again with you in a future as an attending. They should think twice.

 

[DermViser]

But they will think twice, and should they cross again with you in a future as an attending. They should think twice.

 

[calvnandhobbs68]

I think it's more unlikely that they would try to look up the conference, as those are generally a pain in the ass to try to find. The abstract will probably easily be searchable through pubmed though. I would bring it up with the PI...depending on how involved she is, she may not even realize they submitted this stuff without your name on it. At the very least, if there's nothing to be done about it you can let her know you feel kinda screwed in the whole situation. As many of these smaller projects really enjoy the free labor of undergrads/medical students to do the gruntwork, she likely won't want you to be badmouthing her future projects to the rest of the school and might let you in on something else. As for the residents, who gives a crap if they aren't in the field you're going into? What are they gonna do, talk about you to other residents? Don't be scared of the residents bro.

 

[vife]

Similar situation but really not sure what there is to do once it's been published. Sometimes just realize you got to take it as a learning experience and try to pick who you work with better in the future.

 

[Kahreek]

I said twice damn it.

 

[dadaddadaBATMAN]

Hey,

So this came up at one of our meetings on publication. The head of the physiology dept. told us to first talk to the authors themselves...who will hopefully just have made a mistake, and will do what they can.

second step is to go through a department ombudsman. I know who ours is, but I have no idea who this would be in your school. Assuming your school has one. Supposedly it almost never escalates to this point, much less past it.

Whether or not that's worth the risk is up to you, but I would base it on whether or not you'll have contact with/need them in the future (i.e. are they writing letters for you, are they capable of affecting grades or reputation among people who grade you, etc.)

Good luck, and I'm sorry to hear about it.

 

[JFS]

I second going to the primary author first as if it was an accidental omission on their end. You can tell them that you were doing your application and were surprised to see that your name was not in it as had been previously agreed (even better if they communicated this to you over email). If they disagree with you it would not be wise to pursue the matter further.

 

[michaelrack]

Agree with going to the primary author with the attitude that this was probably an oversight. Have a solution to suggest (have the primary author send a letter to the journal that published the abstract correcting the error). The journal might publish an erratum in a future edition. Get a copy of the letter to help substantiate your contribution (in case anyone questions your cv)

 

[235009]

First of all you should familiarize yourself with the criteria for authorship. It is a lot more stringent than you may think and them using a paragraph you wrote from your lit search verbatim is not enough for authorship and neither is collecting data.

Second of all realize that some conferences automatically publish the abstract of all accepted posters in their corresponding journal so this may not have been a two-step process. In the grand scheme of things you're just going to have to let it go. As a med student you really aren't in a position to dictate this kind of stuff and at the end of the day have to take what's given to you.

 

[dadaddadaBATMAN]

First of all you should familiarize yourself with the criteria for authorship. It is a lot more stringent than you may think and them using a paragraph you wrote from your lit search verbatim is not enough for authorship and neither is collecting data.

Second of all realize that some conferences automatically publish the abstract of all accepted posters in their corresponding journal so this may not have been a two-step process. In the grand scheme of things you're just going to have to let it go. As a med student you really aren't in a position to dictate this kind of stuff and at the end of the day have to take what's given to you.

Not sure whose criteria you're working off of, but the ones from the ICMJE (uniform requirements for manuscripts submitted to biomedical journals in 2006) seem reasonable to me.

Must have contributed to:

1. Conception and design of study, or analysis and interpretation of data
2.drafting the review or commenting on it critically for content
3. Final approval of the document to be published

Perhaps it's just me, but it sounds as though OP contributed substantially (at least is his/her own opinion) to 1 and 2.

To my understanding, authorship establishes accountability as well as credit, which is a big part of why number 3 exists.
If they published without consulting or notifying him, there isn't much he/she could do about it...if they did notify OP, then I guess that's sort of on him/her.

As it stands, I don't think there is much that can be done. It's too long after the fact, which makes it seem as though OP had no real role in the project (regardless of the truth of that statement). I agree with the general sentiment here: contact the authors politely, and let it go if nothing comes of it.

 

[goddammitimanauthor]

hi everyone

first, i will address some of your questions to clarify the situation in case someone in the future sees this thread. then ill provide an update.

@MeatTornado and @dadaddadaBATMAN

on an objective level i contributed substantially to this project. this was not a situation where i helped out for three afternoons or something like that. i started working with the residents from the conception of the project through its completion. i did the lit review entirely by myself which basically dictated the direction of the project and shaped how we would ultimately do the study. i ran roughly half of the experimental sessions while the residents ran the other half between the two of them. i did the initial statistical analysis entirely by myself and they used that data to guide what they asked a professional statistician to do. for whatever reason i was largely cut out of the actual submission process other than getting updates about where they had submitted the poster where it had been accepted etc. three people did the work, and i would say the split between us was 35/35/30 with me taking the 30 portion. hopefully that will provide some context for both you and anyone that sees this later. to address the "lateness" the poster presentation happened 2 months ago and the abstract was published literally 2 weeks ago. this didnt happen last year or something

and now the update:

i emailed the attending who oversaw the project since the residents have graduated and i didnt want to irritate them. the attending was very nice, said it was a mistake that she shouldve caught etc, and looked into what could be done. there is no real way to change the abstract so she said she would write a letter discussing the mistake that i can submit as a "supplemental document" on eras. she said this is not unusual or weird and that it wouldnt be a big deal. in the end it worked out.

thanks for your input

 

[dadaddadaBATMAN]

hi everyone

first, i will address some of your questions to clarify the situation in case someone in the future sees this thread. then ill provide an update.

@MeatTornado and @dadaddadaBATMAN

on an objective level i contributed substantially to this project. this was not a situation where i helped out for three afternoons or something like that. i started working with the residents from the conception of the project through its completion. i did the lit review entirely by myself which basically dictated the direction of the project and shaped how we would ultimately do the study. i ran roughly half of the experimental sessions while the residents ran the other half between the two of them. i did the initial statistical analysis entirely by myself and they used that data to guide what they asked a professional statistician to do. for whatever reason i was largely cut out of the actual submission process other than getting updates about where they had submitted the poster where it had been accepted etc. three people did the work, and i would say the split between us was 35/35/30 with me taking the 30 portion. hopefully that will provide some context for both you and anyone that sees this later. to address the "lateness" the poster presentation happened 2 months ago and the abstract was published literally 2 weeks ago. this didnt happen last year or something

and now the update:

i emailed the attending who oversaw the project since the residents have graduated and i didnt want to irritate them. the attending was very nice, said it was a mistake that she shouldve caught etc, and looked into what could be done. there is no real way to change the abstract so she said she would write a letter discussing the mistake that i can submit as a "supplemental document" on eras. she said this is not unusual or weird and that it wouldnt be a big deal. in the end it worked out.

thanks for your input

Context helps a lot, and this makes more sense.

Glad to hear that you'll walk away with something at least!

 

[PhillyMed777]

I volunteered all year (gap) at a lab and was repeatedly told if I "worked for a bit longer, a bit harder, I'd get some publications." It ended up being a whole year thing for me, free for them of course, and i showed up every day on time and stayed 4-6 hours usually. sometimes it was a full work day too (fridays was shorter). Now, I left as i have to go to medical school and i'm wondering if I'll ever get those pub authorships...

 

[sinombre]

I volunteered all year (gap) at a lab and was repeatedly told if I "worked for a bit longer, a bit harder, I'd get some publications." It ended up being a whole year thing for me, free for them of course, and i showed up every day on time and stayed 4-6 hours usually. sometimes it was a full work day too (fridays was shorter). Now, I left as i have to go to medical school and i'm wondering if I'll ever get those pub authorships...

If I were you I would just email the PI directly and ask.

 

[PhillyMed777]

If I were you I would just email the PI directly and ask.

now that i think about it, yeah why not. i probably will in a while (i just left). I couldn't lose anything else.