SPECIAL COMMUNICATION Guest Authorship and Ghostwriting in Publications Related to Rofecoxib ACase Study of Industry Documents FromRofecoxib Litigation

AUTHORSHIP IN BIOMEDICALpublication provides recog-nition while establishing ac-countability and responsibil-ity. Guest authorship has been defined as the designation of an individual who does not meet authorship criteria as an author.1,2 It was identified in 16 % of re-search articles, 26 % of review articles, and 21 % of editorials in a survey of 6 peer-reviewedmedical journals,3 in ad-dition to 41 % of Cochrane reviews.4 Ghostwriting has been defined as the failure to designate an individual (as an author) who has made a substantial contribution to the research or writ-ing of amanuscript.1 Ghostwriting was demonstrated in 13 % of research ar-ticles, 10 % of review articles, 6 % of edi-torials, and 11 % of Cochrane re-views3,4; other research has found similar rates.5 Two studies have characterized the practices of guest authorship and ghost-writing using industry documents, one examining practices related to gaba-pentin by Pfizer Inc and Parke-Davis, Division of Warner-Lambert Com-pany,6 the other sertraline byPfizer Inc.7 However, these studieswere focused on how the research and publication strat