Authorship practices and experiences in a South African Faculty of Health Sciences

Authorship remains a topic of discussion despite clear recommendations by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) adhered to by many publications from health sciences disciplines. This study aimed to review authorship practices and experiences in the Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Free State in Bloemfontein, South Africa, and compare these to the findings of a similar study conducted in 2001. This was a cross-sectional quantitative study with some open-ended questions for qualitative responses. All manuscripts appearing on the final Faculty accredited research output list of 2022 with a Faculty staff member, student or postdoctoral researcher as first author were included. Potential participants (one respondent per manuscript) were contacted via email in the following order: first author, corresponding author, senior author (supervisor), other author, depending on the availability of email addresses. After written informed consent was obtained, structured face-to-face or online video interviews were conducted. The questionnaire consisted of the items included in the 2001 Faculty authorship study as well as issues raised in the ICMJE and Faculty authorship guidelines. Interviews were conducted with 65 respondents regarding 97 (82%) of the 119 manuscripts that qualified for the study. The median number of authors per manuscript was 4 (range 1–13). Only 7% of the manuscripts with more than one author had a formal authorship agreement. For three of the four ICMJE authorship criteria, respondent feedback indicated that all the authors of more than 80% of manuscripts fulfilled the criterion. All authors fulfilled all four criteria in only 48% of manuscripts. Respondents reported problems regarding authorship with 16% of the manuscripts. Forty percent of respondents were unaware of the Faculty authorship guidelines and 62% of the ICMJE authorship criteria. Most manuscripts were multi-authored and adherence to ICMJE criteria was high. Despite the lack of formal authorship agreements, authorship problems were experienced infrequently.