A competing interest (often called a conflict of interest) exists when professional judgment concerning a primary interest (such as patients' welfare or the validity of research) may be influenced by a secondary interest (such as financial gain or personal rivalry). It may arise for the authors of a BMJ article when they have a financial interest that may influence, probably without their knowing, their interpretation of their results or those of others.

We believe that, to make the best decision on how to deal with a paper, we should know about any such competing interests that authors may have, and that if we publish the article readers should know about them too. We are not aiming to eradicate such interests; they are almost inevitable. We will not reject papers simply because you have a conflicting interest, but we want you to make a declaration on whether or not you have competing interests.

For the next few months (from October 2009 to April 2010) the BMJ, along with other journals who are members of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors, is trialling a new, unified disclosure form.

The unified form is intended to make life easier for authors, in that the same form can be completed for several journals, saving authors the trouble of having to provide slightly different information for different journals. Each journal, will, however, integrate the form into its processes in different ways.

The form asks authors to disclose four types of information:

(1) Associations with commercial entities that provided support for the work reported in the submitted manuscript (the time frame for disclosure in this section of the form is the lifespan of the work being reported).

(2) Associations with commercial entities that could be viewed as having an interest in the general area of the submitted manuscript (in the 36 months before submission of the manuscript).

(3) Any similar financial associations involving authors’ spouses, partners, their children under 18 years.

(4) Non-financial associations that may be relevant to the submitted manuscript.  

The form, which is a PDF file that can be completed, is available at www.icmje.org/coi_disclosure.pdf

During the trial we are asking all authors to download and complete a copy of the disclosure form. They should keep a copy of the form and send a copy to the corresponding author, but we do not want them to submit the form to us. Instead we want the corresponding author (or guarantor) to make a statement derived from the information provided in the form and to include that statement in the manuscript.

Thus we are asking the corresponding author of each paper to get all authors to download and complete the form and to lodge a copy of the form with the corresponding author. The corresponding author should then draft a statement in the following format, following the four elements in the disclosure form, and include it in the manuscript.

We also ask the corresponding author to keep the original competing interest forms and make them available on request.

The statement in the manuscript should take the following format. Below are some examples for different sorts of disclosures.

“All authors have completed the Unified Competing Interest form at www.icmje.org/coi_disclosure.pdf (available on request from the corresponding author) and declare that (1) [initials of relevant authors] have support from [name of company] for the submitted work; (2) [initials of relevant authors] have [no or specified] relationships with [name of companies] that might have an interest in the submitted work in the previous 3 years; (3) their spouses, partners, or children have [specified] financial relationships that may be relevant to the submitted work; and (4) [initials of relevant authors] have no [or specified] non-financial interests that may be relevant to the submitted work.”

Examples

No competing interests

“All authors have completed the Unified Competing Interest form at www.icmje.org/coi_disclosure.pdf (available on request from the corresponding author) (URL) and declare that all authors had: (1) No financial support for the submitted work from anyone other than their  employer; (2) No financial relationships with commercial entities that might have an interest in the submitted work; (3) No spouses, partners, or children with relationships with commercial entities that might have an interest in the submitted work; (4) No Non-financial interests that may be relevant to the submitted work.”

Grant funding for research but no other competing interest

“All authors have completed the Unified Competing Interest form at www.icmje.org/coi_disclosure.pdf (available on request from the corresponding author) (URL) and all authors want to declare (1) Financial support for the submitted work from ABC Company. All authors also declare  (2) No financial relationships with commercial entities that might have an interest in the submitted work; (3) No spouses, partners, or children with relationships with commercial entities that might have an interest in the submitted work; (4) No non-financial interests that may be relevant to the submitted work.”

Mixed

“All authors have completed the Unified Competing Interest form at www.icmje.org/coi_disclosure.pdf (available on request from the corresponding author) (URL) and declare that they had  (1) No Financial support for the submitted work. (2) AB has received research grants and honorariums from XYZ company; BF has been paid for developing and delivering educational presentations for BBB Company; DF does consultancy for  HHH and VVV companies. (4) AB chairs the BAA guideline committee on disease Y. The other authors declare no interests under (1), (2), (4), and all authors declare that they have (3) No spouses, partners, or children with relationships with commercial entities that might have an interest in the submitted work.”

“All authors have completed the Unified Competing Interest form at www.icmje.org/coi_disclosure.pdf (available on request from the corresponding author) (URL) and declare (1) Financial support for the submitted work from ABC Company. (2) AB has received research grants and honorariums from XYZ company; BF has been paid for developing and delivering educational presentations for BBB Company; DF does consultancy of HHH and VVV companies. (3) DF’s wife owns company HHH and his son is a director of  company VVV. (4) AB chairs the BAA guideline committee on disease Y. BF is a member of the Royal College of Physicians’ guideline committee on gastroenterology. TT declares no interests under (2), (3), and (4).”

Reviewers

We also ask reviewers to provide statements of competing interests, and we use these when assessing the value of peer review reports.