Editorial: Coping with publication ethics

Nursing academic journals have the responsibility to ensure that their publications add to the existing scientific knowledge base, while maintaining high ethical standards. Good quality nursing research underpins high quality science and supports the development of a robust nursing evidence base. It is the responsibility of journal editors to ensure the highest possible levels of integrity of published research literature in a journal, as decisions on publication ethics are increasingly exposed to scrutiny from the media and society. This challenging task has been helped with the recent publication of the revised and updated Wiley's 'Best Practice Guidelines on Publication Ethics: A Publisher's Perspective 2nd Ed'. Editors can also get very helpful advice on potential breaches of publication ethics from the website of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).