Dear HIFA colleagues,
I have extracted all the questions from our edited compilation document: https://www.hifa.org/sites/default/files/articles/Compilation-OA-short-e...
I have provisionally classified these under subheadings. Some of the questions have been partly answered, while others have yet to receive comments.
If you can help with any of these, please email: hifa@hifaforums.org
1. WHAT IS THE IMPACT OF OPEN ACCESS (OA) ON HEALTH CARE?
1.1 What is the impact of open access to health research on health care?
1.2 Who needs access to original research and why?
1.3 Do health professionals need access to the full text of research to deliver quality health care?
1.4 If all pharma-funded research were open access, would this help drive improvements in patient care?
2. WHAT IS YOUR EXPERIENCE OF OA AS A HEALTHCARE PROFESSIONAL/READER?
2.1 How important is open access publishing for healthcare professionals?
2.2 What are the perceived benefits and barriers of open access publishing for healthcare professionals, as readers and users of scientific content?
2.3 What is the impact of *not* publishing open access on healthcare professionals, especially for those who *do not* have access via an institutional subscription?
2.4 Can you describe a situation where a healthcare professional made a conscious decision to publish with or without OA, including the reasons behind the decision?
2.5 To your knowledge, has open access to research ever saved a life?
2.6 Can anyone say more about the use of PubMed Central as a tool for direct or indirect impact on health? I note from the NLM website that PubMed is used by about 3.5 million people every day, but cannot find figures specifically for PubMed Central. I would like to ask HIFA members: do you use PubMed Central in your work? What difference does it make? Can you give any examples?
3. WHAT IS YOUR EXPERIENCE OF OA AS A RESEARCHER/AUTHOR?
4. HOW WOULD YOU DESIGN AN OA SYSTEM THAT RETAINS THE BENEFITS BUT FIXES THE PROBLEMS OF THE CURRENT OA SYSTEM?
5. OPEN ACCESS AND THE GLOBAL EVIDENCE ECOSYSTEM
5.1 What is the impact of open access to research on the global evidence ecosystem?
5.2 How can open access to research facilitate the six different components of the global evidence ecosystem?
how does open access to primary research enable evidence synthesis such as systematic reviews and clinical guidelines? And in what ways does open access to research facilitate the development of educational resources, formularies, books...?
5.3 How can OA help research and knowledge from LMICs be peer reviewed, published, translated, and disseminated?
5.4 How does open access facilitate the peer review, publication, translation and dissemination of research? With most open access licences, translation and dissemination of research is unrestricted, thereby increasing availability and applicability. Does open access also facilitate peer review, and perhaps some aspects (which?) of the publishing process?
5.5 How can OA help ensure that journal content from LMICs is indexed and discoverable via search engines? (WHO databases may contain LMIC content that is not indexed in other ways, but those databases may not be searched by usual search engines.)
5.6 How can open access initiatives do more to support translation of evidence into practice, especially in low-resource settings?
5.7 Could open access platforms collaborate more with those developing guidelines, job aids, and community health materials, so that synthesized evidence flows more efficiently to end users?
6. PREPRINTS
6.1 What is your exaperience with pre-prints?
7. Article Processing Charges (APCs)
7.1 Some OA journals do not charge APCs. How do they do this?
7.2 Do all the major OA journals rely on APCs?
7.3 What are your views on APC waivers?
7.4 Should funders take responsibility for paying APCs?
8. Artificial intelligence
In what ways will AI change things? Will it reduce costs of processing articles (and thereby potentially lower APCs)?
Many thanks, Neil
HIFA profile: Neil Pakenham-Walsh is coordinator of HIFA (Healthcare Information For All), a global health community that brings all stakeholders together around the shared goal of universal access to reliable healthcare information. HIFA has 20,000 members in 180 countries, interacting in four languages and representing all parts of the global evidence ecosystem. HIFA is administered by Global Healthcare Information Network, a UK-based nonprofit in official relations with the World Health Organization. Email: neil@hifa.org