To maintain the scientific record, no changes can be made to a published article without publishing a corrigendum or an addendum. A corrigendum is a correction of an error in a published scholarly work, while an addendum is an addition of new information, discussion, or results by the author(s) that was not available at the time of the original publication.
Exceptions (where changes can be made without publishing a corrigendum) include:
- minor layout changes/fixes
- typos or grammatical issues that are in the main body of the manuscript and do not affect the content or meaning of a sentence. However, if the typo is a number, a corrigendum is usually required as this changes meaning. If typo is in the title or abstract, a corrigendum is required.
- internal broken links e.g. Multimedia Appendix does not download (however, if the article is already submitted to PMC and the MA was not included, a correction is required)
- minor fixes in references as long as the reference stays essentially the same (we usually do not update broken links to external websites as linkrot over time is to be expected).
It is at the discretion of the editorial/production staff to determine whether a change can be made without a corrigendum.
In order to publish a corrigendum, you should first file a ticket with prod-support@jmir.org and briefly describe what you would like to have changed. We will evaluate the request and investigate the cause and severity of the error (if any).
The possible outcomes are as follows:
- The error was introduced after the final proofreading step (or the authors brought it to our attention during proofreading and we failed to correct this). As this is the publishers' responsibility, we will submit a corrigendum on authors’ behalf. There are no costs for them.
- The error is an update/correction of something that was in the original submission, or this error was in the proofs and the authors did not make a correction at the time. Requests like "I forgot to acknowledge somebody" or "there is an error in one of the authors' names" are what we call a "Discretionary Corrigendum," as it is an oversight that is the authors' responsibility but not severe enough to affect the validity of the paper. We can correct it, but reserve the right to charge a fee of $190 for publishing the corrigendum, correcting the original article, linking it to the corrigendum, and resubmitting the article to various databases and/or making changes to the PubMed record.
- We do not think the error you have mentioned is a problem and requires any action/correction.
- The error is a minor layout change and can be made without publishing a corrigendum.
In case 1 or 2, a corrigendum has to be published and a correction notice has to be sent to various databases to notify them.
Process for submitting a corrigendum or addendum
The process for submitting a corrigendum or addendum is as follows:
-
In the case of a corrigendum (to correct an error) or an addendum (to supplement the published work with new information), submit a word file containing a short description through the manuscript submission system to the journal where the article was published. The description must clearly state the nature of the submission (corrigendum or addendum) and detail the exact information that needs to be corrected or added. For a corrigendum, you can use the template here; and see previous examples here: http://www.jmir.org/collection/view/38).
In the case of a corrigendum, please do not resubmit the revised paper. Rather, you need to upload a file that explains what should be changed, quoting the original sentence [author name, reference, affiliation...] and the new sentence [author name, reference, affiliation...]. Please use past tense as if the change s already made.
Example:
Under "Methods", first paragraph, the phrase "MMAS will be used to measure adherence.." has been replaced by "XY will be used to measure adherence...".
- During the submission process, choose "Discretionary Corrigendum" as section.
- The title of the manuscript/submission should be "Correction: (original title)" or "Addendum: (original title).
- Carefully add all authors, ORCIDs and their affiliations in metadata, exactly the same way as in the original article, unless they were wrong in the original article.
- In case of authorship changes: Submit a letter signed by all authors as specified below.
Important note on author changes after publication:
See JMIR Publications policy on authorship changes post-publication
What happens when a corrigendum or addendum is published?
- We publish a correction or addendum statement (similar to those published here).
- The original article will be fixed/amended and on top of that article we display a link to the correction statement or addendum, saying that the article was amended.
- We submit the correction or addendum and re-submit the original article to various databases, e.g. PubMed Central.
- If metadata changes of the original article are required (e.g. author name corrections, corrections in the abstract), we may make these changes also directly in PubMed. The PubMed entry will have a link to the correction as well ("Correction Published in ...")
To remove a paper entirely from the scientific record (e.g. if major errors or scientific misconduct are found) please see the Knowledge Base article on Retractions (What is the process for retractions?).