Major leadership:
Includes past President of World Association of Medical Editors
Current Editor in Chief, Annals of Emergency Medicine
Founding Chair, Department of Emergency Medicine, UCSF

For the first part of my career my research interests included various types of clinical research including pre-hospital controlled trials on topics such as epinephrine dosing and mechanical aids in CPR and ACLS. In recent years I have begun to feel that the traditional RCT approach is too narrowly focused and will never keep up, much less catch up, with the vast majority of medical problems whose treatment is not evidence based, or whose evidence is out of date.

Because of my editorial and publishing experience, as well as my experiences as an organizer of a number of International Peer Review Congresses (Jama and BMJ), my research interests now have turned to trying to better understand the scientific peer review publication process through research into methods of educating peer reviewers, as well as research into bias and its impact on scientific publication. I am still engaged in this area of research because no effective interventions for improving peer review have yet been identified (contrary to the beliefs of many), and the workings (and thus the remediation) of bias due to conflict of interest are unexplored terrain - at least, unexplored by physicians. My most current research interest focuses on the impact of disclosure of conflicts of interest.