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A Randomized Trial

Robert A. McNutt, MD; Arthur T. Evans, MD; Robert H. Fletcher, MD, MSc; Suzanne W. Fletcher, MD, MSc

JAMA. 1990;263(10):1371-1376.

Abstract
Peer reviewers are blinded sometimes to authors' and institutions' names, but the effects of blinding on review quality are not known. We, therefore, conducted a randomized trial of blinded peer review. Each of 127 consecutive manuscripts of original research that were submitted to the Journal of General Internal Medicine were sent to two external reviewers, one of whom was randomly selected to receive a manuscript with the authors' and institutions' names removed. Reviewers were asked, but not required, to sign their reviews. Blinding was successful for 73% of reviewers. Quality of reviews was higher for the blinded manuscripts (3.5 vs 3.1 on a 5-point scale). Forty-three percent of reviewers signed their reviews, and blinding did not affect the proportion who signed. There was no association between signing and quality. Our study shows that, in our setting, blinding improves the quality of reviews and that research on the effects of peer review is possible.

(JAMA. 1990;263:1371-1376)

Author Affiliations
From the Division of General Internal Medicine and Clinical Epidemiology, Department of Medicine (Drs McNutt, Evans, R. H. Fletcher, and S. W. Fletcher), and the Department of Epidemiology, School of Public Health (Drs R. H. Fletcher and S. W. Fletcher), the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; and the Journal of General Internal Medicine, Philadelphia, Pa (Drs McNutt, Evans, R. H. Fletcher, and S. W. Fletcher).

Footnotes
Presented at The First International Congress on Peer Review in Biomedical Publication, Chicago, Ill, May 10-12, 1989.

Reprint requests to Division of General Internal Medicine and Clinical Epidemiology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Room 5029, CB# 7110, Chapel Hill, NC 27514 (Dr McNutt).

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