I am the editor of the Indian Journal of Dermatology, Venereology and Leprology. Recently, I was surprised to find that the same patient has been reported in two different articles submitted to our journal by different author groups from two different institutes from the same city. Being a dermatology journal, the patient was identified as the same by the photographs submitted by them.

By convention, it would have been appropriate to accept the first submitted report (based on submission dates) and reject the second one. However, it so happens that the first one is written as a letter to editor with important details of the case missing, while the second one is written as a case report and has all the necessary details. We were planning to give a chance to the first group to improve their report with more details. But what should we do if they do not have the data? Would we be within our rights to reject the first report and accept the second one?

Please give your opinion and share similar experiences if such a thing has happened before.

Uday Khopkar
Chief Editor, Indian Journal of Dermatology, Venereology and Leprology
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There may be another way to look at this issue. The editor may assume, theoretically, that these two reports belong to two different patients, and are competing for limited space in her/his journal. Which of these ‘competing’ reports will the editor like to publish? This should provide the answer.

I would opt for the paper that provides more relevant information.

Rakesh Aggarwal
Associate Editor, Indian Journal of Gastroenterology
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There are some points regarding this issue that should be considered:

I think this is the old story of "Authorship criteria". Do all these authors from both institutes fulfill Authorship criteria? If so, why do they prefer to report the case in different papers?

I wonder how many authors a case report can have. Maybe two or, at most, three. So, one solution for this matter is that the editor can ask the authors to provide the information about the specific types of contribution each author had. This method is used by many journals whenever there is a long list of authors. Ethical committees in different countries are available to go through such problems, I suppose.

Finally, if the editor decided to choose the first article (for any reason) for publication, he or she must ask the authors to improve the article with the most needed information. 

Behrooz Astaneh
Deputy Editor, Iranian Journal of Medical Sciences
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If two groups independently submit articles reporting the same data, then this is clearly a problem, whether the article in question is a case report or a trial. I don't think that proceeding with publication of either article is an option until you have resolved this situation. The convention on priority only applies to independent projects that are addressing the same research question, but separately. Put simply, you can't have two groups of authors both trying to pass off the same work as entirely their own.

I believe that you should ask the corresponding authors of each to explain how the two articles came to be written and submitted separately. You could also ask them to explain the exact relationship between the two articles and research groups, and the contributions of each author to the article. You may need to contact the institutes of both groups depending on the answers you receive. I would also question whether a patient really would have given written informed consent to publication of their case details twice to two different groups. This seems unlikely to me, so I would suggest asking the authors again about consent to publish from the patient.

Matt Hodgkinson-Barrett
Senior Editor, BMC-series Journals
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Perhaps the two reports originated in a scenario similar to the following: Physicians from two different specialties consult on the same patient. Both groups recognize the publication potential of the case and independently begin to prepare a case report. I have been asked who has the right to publish the case. My best response was to encourage the authors to get written patient permission as soon as they think they might have a publishable case. This example was also clouded with a power differential where resident physicians comprised one group and faculty physicians the other group. Are there any guidelines or suggestions related to this type of conflict? 

Victoria Neale
Deputy Editor, J Am Board Fam Med
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It certainly is very important to ask both groups of authors about their role in the case management of the patient and authorship. There is of course the possibility that a patient may be managed by two separate teams (at the same or different hospitals/clinics) and both teams independently decide to report the case study. It is also possible for the patient to provide consent to both teams. In my setting, many of my patients are expected not to be concerned about the issues that journal editors worry about. So, as many requests are they come can be accepted. However, if I were the author in a situation like this, and I had honestly participated in the care of the patient and had submitted a case study that another team has also submitted, I would seriously consider whether the editor may allow both of us (the two teams) to write a joint manuscript (if the editor thinks he or she will publish it). Certainly I would feel insulted if the editor advised a joint manuscript that (s)he then decided to reject.

Adamson Muula
Malawi Medical Journal
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I wonder whether it would be practical, or even desirable in this instance, to contact both sets of authors and suggest that, in the spirit of scientific cooperation, they pool their resources  and submit a single, jointly-authored manuscript with their insights of the case.

Miguel Roig