JOINSTM publishes recommendations to improve medical and health science data sharing policies
STM has published new voluntary recommendations as a practical aid to help publishers and journals improve the clarity of data sharing information for medical and health science researchers — a field where participant privacy, regulatory requirements, and ethical obligations make generic policy language especially difficult to apply.
STM Medical Data Sharing Guidance was developed by an STM Task & Finish Group, bringing together publisher representatives who drew on input from pharmaceutical industry experts through a series of workshops to map the current landscape and identify recurring gaps. Working within the framework of the Research Data Alliance’s endorsed data sharing policy structure, the guidance covers data definitions, exceptions to sharing mandates, embargoes, data repositories, data availability statements, licensing, and the FAIR Data Principles — expanded throughout with best-practice examples from leading medical journals.
“Medical and health research has specific requirements that sit beyond the scope of general data sharing guidance. This resource gives publishers and journals practical information on where specific language and practical detail can support authors — and in doing so, to strengthen both the consistency and the trustworthiness of published results.”
— Matt Cannon, Associate Director, Open Science Programmes, Taylor & Francis Group.
The guidance has been developed in consultation with the STM Open Research Committee, RDA working groups, and data policy experts across the community, and is now available for publishers to use freely. It complements STM’s broader work on research data, including the 2023 Joint Statement on Research Data with DataCite and Crossref.
For a deeper look at the problem this guidance addresses and how it was developed, read the accompanying piece in The Scholarly Kitchen.