Critical appraisal of predatory journals in pathology

Predatory journals refer to journals that recruit articles through aggressive marketing and spam emails, promising a quick, but not robust, review and fast open-access (OA) publication, thus compromising scholarly publishing standards.1–5 Their key motive is a financial benefit via article processing charges (APCs) and other additional fees.1 3 4 The number of OA journals has dramatically risen over the past 15 years,6 reaching 11 376 journals, indexed in the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) in 2018 (available at https://doaj.org). This expansion was parallel to the increase in the number of predatory publishers.7 8 Predatory journals have become more prevalent than ever due to massive internet expansion and extensive spam email soliciting.2 4 9 Since 2011, when Jeffrey Beall launched his first list of potential predatory OA publishers and journals, predatory journals have come into focus.3 4 Recent studies have highlighted the significant burden of potentially predatory journals in several biomedical specialties, including neuroscience/neurology, urology, emergency medicine, physical medicine, orthopaedics, rehabilitation, as well as anaesthesiology.7 8 10–13 No study on predatory journals in pathology has been conducted so far. As previously suggested, we explored Beall’s list of predatory journals as an initial database of suspected journals related to pathology.2 8 The term predatory was only applied after assessing each journal separately. The assessment was based on the recommended …