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Why physicians should publish, how easy it is, and how important it is in clinical work

Marušić Matko (Croatian medical journal, Zagreb University School of medicine, Zagreb, Croatia)

The author maintains that a physician must publish because the knowledge is property of the entire mankind, because scientific journals offer the most reliable (medical) information, and because the process of publishing serves also as a final education of true experts. Publishing can become relatively easy if the investigation is properly planned and the report is adequately written. Both should be a joint effort of all authors of the study. It is easier to publish in clinical than in preclinical research field for at least seven reasons: 1) in clinical work the variety of patients stimulate formulation of hypothesis, 2) the spectrum of possible and desirable research themes is rather wide, researchers can make use of hospital routine laboratories, and even individual cases are acceptable as research reports 3) it is acceptable, even desirable, to repeat already published studies, 4) multicentric studies enable weaker institutions to join strong and more experienced ones and thus participate in high-quality research, 5) imperfection of the studies is tolerated because journal editors are aware of the complexity of clinical work, 6) there is a degree of automatic financing of research, and 7) there is a large number of both general and highly specialized journals which yearn for papers.

Keywords: Research, Publishing, Clinical Medicine, Physicians