Potential Review paper with Clinician

[kazekage2016]

I've been shadowing a cardiologist and I've asked him about doing some clinical research. He reluctantly agrees but then puts it off until I ask again. At the beginning, he said I could do some sort of review paper. Should I take more initiative and suggest some topics that I can start looking into, or should I look somewhere else for Research? How time intensive is writing up an article like this?

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[Redpancreas]

I've been shadowing a cardiologist and I've asked him about doing some clinical research. He reluctantly agrees but then puts it off until I ask again. At the beginning, he said I could do some sort of review paper. Should I take more initiative and suggest some topics that I can start looking into, or should I look somewhere else for Research? How time intensive is writing up an article like this?

Sounds like he has no time to mentor you but would be happy to proofread whatever you do complete on your own.

 

[kazekage2016]

So should I pick a topic on my own and start writing something up, or should I send some suggested topics to him and have him choose one.

 

[Raney Schauer]

I don't think you realize what a massive undertaking a review is. This will take you at least a year to do correctly if it's to be published at all.

 

[Raney Schauer]

Sounds like he has no time to mentor you but would be happy to proofread whatever you do complete on your own.

And put his name on at the end of the byline.

 

[Psai]

A review paper is something that should be written by an expert in the topic with years of experience in the field and intimate familiarity with both the subject matter and the body of literature surrounding it. Doing quality research is something that takes a lot of thought, time, money and effort. You don't even have the foundation to understand anything you'll be trying to review, never mind creating a relevant and useful summary.

 

[evilbooyaa]

Writing a review paper as a medical student that has not been solicited (meaning guaranteed or near-guaranteed publication) is not an intelligent move, IMO.

 

[kazekage2016]

How would you guarantee publication? He is definitely an expert in the field since he's at a top institution and is very involved with research. He also publishes in top journals for that field. He could definitely be a mentor on it and help get it published.

 

[Raney Schauer]

A review paper is something that should be written by an expert in the topic with years of experience in the field and intimate familiarity with both the subject matter and the body of literature surrounding it. Doing quality research is something that takes a lot of thought, time, money and effort. You don't even have the foundation to understand anything you'll be trying to review, never mind creating a relevant and useful summary.

This. A review is something you do as a PhD candidate, post-doc or tenure track PhD. A proper review can have hundreds of references.

 

[Dwan]

How would you guarantee publication? He is definitely an expert in the field since he's at a top institution and is very involved with research. He also publishes in top journals for that field. He could definitely be a mentor on it and help get it published.

Most of the "easy" reviews that medical students do are ones where their PI was invited to write one by the journals themselves (thus a near guaranteed publication). It'll be hard to publish an unsolicited review as a non-expert, but if you want to do one, start reading up on how to do a proper systematic review. Make sure your topic is valuable and approved by the PI before undertaking this task as it will be time-consuming and has the risk of being a wasted effort.

 

[sovereign0]

I don't think you realize what a massive undertaking a review is. This will take you at least a year to do correctly if it's to be published at all.

A review paper is something that should be written by an expert in the topic with years of experience in the field and intimate familiarity with both the subject matter and the body of literature surrounding it. Doing quality research is something that takes a lot of thought, time, money and effort. You don't even have the foundation to understand anything you'll be trying to review, never mind creating a relevant and useful summary.

Writing a review paper as a medical student that has not been solicited (meaning guaranteed or near-guaranteed publication) is not an intelligent move, IMO.

Most of the "easy" reviews that medical students do are ones where their PI was invited to write one by the journals themselves (thus a near guaranteed publication). It'll be hard to publish an unsolicited review as a non-expert, but if you want to do one, start reading up on how to do a proper systematic review. Make sure your topic is valuable and approved by the PI before undertaking this task as it will be time-consuming and has the risk of being a wasted effort.

Any advice for medical students that are "tasked"/"solicited" to write a review paper? Other than "don't do it"?

 

[Raney Schauer]

Any advice for medical students that are "tasked"/"solicited" to write a review paper? Other than "don't do it"?

Set realistic expectations for your time commitment for a clear stake. Make it tactfully clear that you are willing to devote X hours per week at Y specific times. If you don't know the lead author or the PI of the review very well you may inadvertently find yourself in the middle of someone else's emergency deadline of their own creation.

Never, ever let failure to plan on someone else's part become an emergency on your part. This is a great way to set yourself up to soak up blame for a disaster that you had no part in creating. Don't take collateral damage by being in the blast radius if the project goes south.

You're a medical student first and foremost and the majority of your time should be devoted to that. No one cares if you're getting you ish done, just as long as you're getting their ish done. A review can turn into an unintended time-suck. It feels great to be asked and it's awesome to be a part of something potentially useful but remember that a review is not primary literature and, while useful, isn't super hot stuff. It just shows that you've plowed through a bunch of material and organized it. Anyone can do that.

No one cites a review, they just use them to get an idea of what a subject is about and then use your reference section to find primary literature, and that's the stuff that gets cited.

I say all this because this is the kinds of zany hijinks and shenanigans that goes on all the time.

TLDR: Unless you're striking for a Ph.D, be a contributor but don't get caught up in it.

 

[evilbooyaa]

Any advice for medical students that are "tasked"/"solicited" to write a review paper? Other than "don't do it"?

If there's a far away deadline, and you're being asked by the person who was directly solicited by a journal (meaning no other people in the pipeline) then consider it if you're really trying to go into the field.

If the person asking you was not explicitly asked by the journal to do so, or there's another body in the way that is going to take first authorship, then run. Review articles are a lot of work that realistically are mostly one man writing, one man reviewing jobs, with some additional people added on for fun or to give it a multidisciplinary feel. The amoutn of time necessary to write a review article is more than what is necessary to crank out a quick chart review for second author (which is what med students should be focusing on, IMO).

That being said, review articles can be cited significantly, especially if in a high-visibility journal. Especially if they're solicited.

 

[boogiecousins94]

Question that kinda stems off from this- my school starts in less than a month, but my PI from my 2+ year full time research job asked me to write a review paper that we were invited to write. It is relatively similar to another review article we have published (although somewhat different). The question I have is when is the best time to actually start writing it? I haven't done anything yet as I'm still working full time and getting stuff ready to move etc. This paper is due in November so I have time. I assume I'll have time to finish it during school? Idk if I can "back out" of it and it's still in a journal with an IF of ~10 so I feel like I should try my best to do it still. Thoughts? I just want to make sure if it's "impossible" to do with school I figure that out now. I've written and published other review articles before, just not when I have medical school at the same time.

 

[sab3156]

I've been shadowing a cardiologist and I've asked him about doing some clinical research. He reluctantly agrees but then puts it off until I ask again. At the beginning, he said I could do some sort of review paper. Should I take more initiative and suggest some topics that I can start looking into, or should I look somewhere else for Research? How time intensive is writing up an article like this?

The best scenario is that you have a mentor with solicitation (aka invitation) from a journal for a review and that the mentor is willing to allow you to write it with his/her guidance. This should be the case before you can even think about writing one as a medical student, especially if you have limited experience in scientific writing. Contrary to what some people are saying, a review doesn't take a full year to write. However, it is obviously more difficult and more literature-heavy than most other types of scientific papers. For this reason, you must not only have a research mentor who is an expert in the subject, the mentor must be someone who you can trust to provide you with great support and guidance. Otherwise you're basically screwed, and your review will be nothing more than useless garbage to the scientific community.

Be realistic with yourself. This person you are shadowing seems reluctant to involve you in research and probably doesn't have any incentive to help you. These are classic signs of a person who doesn't enjoy research and teaching. This means you should stay away from him for anything relating to a literature review. Clearly going to be a huge time sink and yield nothing at the end.