gms | German Medical Science

Medical education research journals publish different types of articles. In addition to original articles, there are, for example, reports on innovations that present novel solutions to problems and challenges in education [1], [2], [3], as well as specific types of articles that deal with the practical implementation of certain procedures, such as the introduction of new teaching and assessment formats.

The article types are named differently in the different journals, e.g. publications on innovations are published under the following headings:

• Innovation Reports in Academic Medicine [4],
• Discursive Articles in Anatomical Science Education [5],
• Project Report in the GMS Journal for Medical Education [6],
• Innovations in Medical Education in the Journal of General Internal Medicine [7],
• Educational Innovation in the Journal of Graduate Medical Education [8] or
• Really Good Stuff in Medical Education [9].

The following sections are available for article types that deal with the practical implementation of teaching, learning, and assessment formats:

• The Clinical Teacher’s Toolbox in The Clinical Teacher [10],
• How to in the GMS Journal for Medical Education [6] or
• Twelve Tips in the Medical Teacher [11].

Research papers must follow a structure based on the IMRaD scheme: introduction, methods, results, and discussion. This same structure is used for structuring the acceptance and rejection criteria, as exemplified by the GMS Journal for Medical Education (GMS J Med Educ) [12]. These criteria are missing for the article types just described. Colbert and Getz (2021) identified a wide range of key features in innovation reports in their review [13]. However, only two of the twelve characteristics were found to be congruent. These were the description of the problem and the description of the implementation of the innovation. All other characteristics varied across the journals and sometimes even within a single journal. It is evident that specifications are required for the innovation report article type, and that corresponding evaluation criteria must be derived. A meeting of the Editorial Board of GMS J Med Educ also revealed the need for a specification of the article types project report (corresponds to the article type innovation report) and how to, as well as the need for clear evaluation criteria for reviewers. As a result, the Committee on Methodology in Educational Research of the DACH Association for Medical Education (GMA) undertook the task of developing appropriate criteria.

These criteria are intended to ensure that

• authors can write their articles in a more targeted manner, e.g., to reduce the probability of a revision being needed or even the rejection of the submission due to content or qualitative deficiencies.
• Reviewers are supported in their work to ensure they arrive independently at reviews that are as congruent as possible and not fundamentally contradictory.
• Editors are supported to make more transparent and consistent decisions about manuscripts.
• The overall quality of publications of these two article types is demonstrably improved.
• Readers should be able to find articles of good quality and also associate the magazine with a certain profile or expect a certain range of contributions.

This position paper sets out the criteria for accepting, revising, or rejecting manuscripts of the article types project report and how to in the GMS J Med Educ. The first step is to identify (1) the general core elements for all article types. Core elements are superordinate characteristics that must be present. Based on these core elements, (2) necessary aspects to be addressed can then be derived, and (3) rejection criteria can be formulated. This is necessary because there is very little information about article type how to as opposed to article type project report.

Eight experts from the Committee on Methodology in Educational Research plus one editor-in-chief of the GMS J Med Educ were available. All participants were experienced authors, seven of them were also experienced reviewers, and one individual was a member of the editorial board of GMS J Med Educ.

In addition to the expertise of the individuals involved, the development process was based on the guidelines for authors of relevant journals in the field of medical education in which comparable article types are published. Furthermore, if available, the corresponding review criteria of these journals were taken into account. This primarily concerned the journals Anatomical Science Education [5], Medical Education [9], The Clinical Teacher [10], and Medical Teacher [11], as their guidelines contain detailed information on the review of and requirements for these article types.

In addition, project reports in GMS J Med Educ were selected as exemplars of successful and less successful reporting practices. The sole published how to in GMS J Med Educ was consulted.

In the initial phase, the importance of the two article formats, particularly in the context of the GMS J Med Educ journal, was determined in accordance with the guidelines for authors and following consultation with the editorial board. In the second step, comparable article types from other journals in the field of medical education were identified. Corresponding guidelines for authors and reviewers were then sought, and, where available, respective review criteria were compiled. In the third step, criteria were compiled with reference to the materials described in 2.2, which, from the participants’ point of view, can assist reviewers in accepting, revising, or rejecting a manuscript.

In January 2023, the experts engaged in a one-day on-site work phase, during which they discussed, selected, rephrased as necessary, and categorized the criteria based on prepared examples of project reports. The diverse viewpoints of the participants, including those of writers, reviewers, and members of the editorial board, were explicitly incorporated into the process. The categories were designated, and the criteria were assigned via a moderated group discussion until all participants reached a consensus on the outcome. The authors identified common core elements from the aforementioned consented criteria, which can be applied to all article types. This was done in order to subsequently derive criteria for the relatively new article type how to for which only a limited number of examples were available.

Target group, relevance, justification, and implications were identified as common core elements for project report and how to, which also apply to original articles but must be defined according to the respective article type (see table 1 [Tab. 1]). The target group determines the importance of the other core elements. For the target group of researchers, the objective is to gain knowledge, with the research methodology serving as a means of justifying the results and their significance. For practicing educators, the practical applicability of solutions to problems is typically of greater consequence than theoretical considerations. The target groups of research and/or practice also vary across journals. This must also be considered when reviewing manuscripts. The relevance of an article is contingent upon the expectations of the target audience with respect to the specific type of article in question. The authors should ensure that the added value for the respective target group is clearly evident, regardless of whether the objective is to gain knowledge or to solve a practical problem. The core element of justification is to ensure the reliability of outcomes or the soundness of proposed solutions. The core element implications focuses more on the theoretical implications, i.e., the contribution to knowledge in the subject area and/or the practical usefulness of the solutions presented, depending on the type of article.

The core elements can be used to specify review criteria. A need for revision arises when the core elements are unclear or inadequately described in the manuscript being reviewed. If core elements are completely missing, the article should be rejected.

The aim of project reports is to present a problem in medical education and to develop (innovative) solutions. A project report should present a common problem, possible solutions, and, of course, the project itself and its contribution to solving the problem. The argumentation of the problem, the selection of the solution approaches, the project objective, and the implementation must be presented in a comprehensible way. The manuscript must be revised if it lacks a recognizable, consistent structure or if the content is not described in a comprehensible and coherent manner. Aspects to be addressed and the derived rejection criteria are presented in table 2 [Tab. 2].

The aim of the how to article type in the GMS J Med Educ is to present practical tips on a topic or conceptual considerations for undergraduate, graduate, and postgraduate education. Again, the core elements will need to be addressed. In addition to justifying the need for the article and defining the target group, the implementation instructions should be comprehensible, feasible, and at a similar level of abstraction. Aspects to be addressed and rejection criteria are listed in table 3 [Tab. 3].

With respect to writing and reviewing educational research articles, common core elements have been identified that need to be appropriately defined for each article type. Based on this, aspects to be addressed (by the authors) and evaluation criteria to be considered (by the reviewers) were agreed upon for the project report and how to article types. If core elements are missing, a manuscript should be rejected. Revision is necessary when the aspects to be addressed are not adequately described or are not clearly understood.

With the project report and how to formats, GMS J Med Educ aims to expand the circle of authors and readers beyond the “classic” formats (mainly original and review articles). As the house organ of the DACH Association for Medical Education (GMA), the journal aims to promote exchange among GMA members, but also with all those interested in teaching, learning, and educational research (worldwide), and thus to contribute to the further development of these areas. Since the GMA is a scientific society and a member of the Association of the Scientific Medical Societies in Germany (AWMF), quality standards must also be defined for the article types project report and how to. Future authors should benefit from the current definition of requirements and criteria, as complying with them is expected to increase the chances of a manuscript being accepted in a transparent and fair review process. In a very pragmatic way, the aspects and rejection criteria we have defined should also facilitate the volunteer work of editors and reviewers by providing a more structured review process. Last but not least, readers should benefit from our proposal, as we aim to improve the overall quality of publications in GMS J Med Educ.

Several journals have stated criteria such as “fills an important gap” [7], or “[filling a] gap in existing practice” [8], “novelty” (e. g. “the idea is new” [7]; “innovations that are novel [...] will be more successful” [8]) or “originality on display” [14] as requirements for a project to be worthy of publication. Kanter (2008) discusses in an editorial that an innovation can be “a creative solution to a problem”, but emphasizes that the difference between the innovation and existing or known solutions must then be described [15]. This meets our requirement to address the innovative nature of a project in the introductory section of a project report. However, the discussions among the participants showed that it is a challenge to assess whether a described project is “sufficiently innovative” to justify publication in a scientific journal such as GMS J Med Educ. In introducing the innovations in medical education article type, Cook et al. (2010) also addressed the issue of defining “true innovation” and concluded that new approaches to addressing educational and teaching challenges were preferable to existing approaches applied to new topics or new groups of learners [16]. Durning et al. (2020) define innovation reports to be published in the Academic Medicine category of the same name as reports of new ideas that have the potential to improve the quality of education and health care by addressing common problems in novel ways, where the approach may be pedagogical, programmatic, or methodological [3]. Durning et al. point out that the category is “deliberately flexible” to cover a wide range of topics, from program evaluations to conceptual contributions. This heterogeneity makes it difficult to assess its innovative character and suggests that decisions need to be made on a case-by-case basis. Accordingly, the authors of the current article concluded that no generalizable rejection criteria can be defined for reviewing project reports for innovation.

With regard to the how to article type, we believe it is essential that submissions provide a sound rationale for the need for publication and that the content of the manuscript is appropriate for the readership of the GMS J Med Educ. How to articles are intended as application-oriented instructions, so a recognizable benefit for practical implementation is considered a prerequisite for publication eligibility. Here, too, scientific standards must be observed, and approaches or procedures must be empirically or theoretically justified. With regard to possible other relevant contexts, the transferability of what has been described is important, but again, no generalizable criteria could be defined for its evaluation.

We describe here the results of a consensus process among the authors of this article. It is obviously difficult to base the results on evidence. However, consideration was given to what experts in the field of teaching, learning, and educational research have published in internationally renowned journals, for example in the form of editorials or commentaries on the formats and questions discussed. In addition, the participants contributed their experiences from different disciplines and professions, reflecting the heterogeneity of publications on training, teaching and learning in the context of different health professions. Finally, the defined criteria must be tested and evaluated in practice.

• Katrin Schüttpelz-Brauns: [0000-0001-9004-0724]
• Angelika Homberg: [0000-0001-5585-1126]
• Marianne Giesler: [0000-0001-9384-2343]
• Achim Schneider: [0000-0002-8602-8535]
• Pia Gadewoltz: [0009-0000-0632-6536]
• Martin Boeker: [0000-0003-2972-2042]
• Jan Matthes: [0000-0003-2754-1555]

We would like to thank Götz Fabry, editor of GMS J Med Educ, for his invaluable contribution, particularly regarding the core elements.

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.