{"doi":"10.1111/anae.16655","title":"Editorial commitment to trust and integrity in science: implications for pain and anaesthesiology research*","abstract":"We are a group of journal editors (online Supporting Information Appendix S1) dedicated to advancing discoveries and innovations in basic, translational and clinical research across anaesthesiology and pain-related disciplines, which play a crucial role in reducing the burden of pain, improving health, enhancing peri-operative outcomes and optimising healthcare delivery. Across scientific disciplines, concerns have been raised about research quality and trustworthiness [1, 2]. While these challenges are not unique to pain and anaesthesiology research, we recognise this as a judicious opportunity to raise awareness and collaborate across our journals to align and strengthen initiatives to enhance research integrity, trust, and impact across our field. In a 2005 landmark paper, John Ioannidis concluded with the dramatic and troubling assertion that “most published research findings are false”, stimulating a large focus in the biomedical research community on understanding issues of integrity, reproducibility and replication that continues to be relevant to this day [3]. Indeed, there are many instances in which authors, institutions, funders, publishers and journals have failed to embody the core values that produce trustworthy science. The trustworthiness of research is affected by both intentional actions (e.g. fabrication and falsification of data, lack of rigour and image manipulation) and unintentional actions (e.g. inadequate oversight, awareness and understanding of both technical and scientific issues). Most concerning are instances of research misconduct including fabrication, falsification or plagiarism, sometimes revealed by failure to replicate or reproduce results, duplication of publications, a rise in the number of retractions [4, 5] and calls for larger numbers of papers to be retracted (for example [2]). In support of Ioannidis' disquiet, some reviews (for example [6, 7]) report low replication rates of positive findings in the social and life sciences across clinical trials, epidemiological research and molecular studies. In anaesthesiology specifically, low agreement has been found between randomised clinical trials (RCTs) and meta-analytic findings for clinical pain interventions, where positive findings in meta-analyses were often not confirmed by subsequent large RCTs. For example, using individual patient data from RCTs published in Anaesthesia, Carlisle demonstrated that almost half of the databases had false data as detected from the duplication of figures, tables, and other data from published work; the duplication of data in the rows and columns of spreadsheets; impossible values; and incorrect data analytic strategies and calculations [8]. Reproducibility, clinical validity and utility in pain and anaesthesiology research are often compromised by non-representative samples (e.g. limited representation on characteristics such as race, ethnicity, age, sex/gender or socio-economic status that do not match population-level data of those most affected by pain) [9-11]; reliance on surrogate outcomes with limited clinical relevance; underutilisation of common data elements and core outcome sets; underpowered studies prone to false-negative results; and flawed statistical analysis plans that generate misleading conclusions [12]. To ensure integrity of the literature, retraction of articles may be necessary due to such issues as major errors; data fabrication; plagiarism; or unethical research practices. The authors are encouraged to identify errors in their own work and may request a corrigendum to correct the literature. However, when ethical issues are brought to a journal's attention, they have a duty to investigate and, when there is conclusive evidence, to impose a retraction to alert readers that the findings and conclusions cannot be relied upon [13]. Retractions, when reported, can have a widespread impact due to the interconnectedness of studies attributed to the same authors [14]. 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Hemmings","orcid":"0000-0002-6043-5482","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":402034,"name":"Robert W. Hurley","orcid":"0000-0001-6591-9390","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":666178,"name":"Joel Katz","orcid":"0000-0002-8686-447X","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1455734,"name":"Jaideep J. Pandit","orcid":"0000-0003-3477-9780","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":257966,"name":"Theodore J. Price","orcid":"0000-0002-6971-6221","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1089724,"name":"Michael E Schatman","orcid":"0000-0002-1019-0413","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1455735,"name":"Stephan Schwarz","orcid":"0000-0002-3584-1032","position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":252816,"name":"Dennis C. Turk","orcid":null,"position":10,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1456164,"name":"Marc Van de Velde","orcid":null,"position":11,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":84052,"name":"M. D. Wiles","orcid":"0000-0003-2299-0060","position":12,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":254291,"name":"Tony L. Yaksh","orcid":"0000-0003-4297-536X","position":13,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":831894,"name":"David Yarnitsky","orcid":"0000-0002-2293-2090","position":14,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":233886,"name":"Tonya M. Palermo","orcid":"0000-0001-6036-6715","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":28,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T02:55:08.896385Z","pmid":"40590570","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}