Preparation of a scientific paper on clinical laser research or applications: pitfalls and how to avoid them

Abstract

It is said that clinicians today learn less and less about more and more until they end up knowing nothing about everything, whereas researchers learn more and more about less and less until they end up knowing everything about nothing. This is a phenomenon which is slowly creeping into the field of clinical applications and basic research in laser surgery and laser therapy. This trend is definitely to be discouraged, as it will effectively narrow the scope of both clinicians and researchers at a time when the scope needs to be expanded just as appropriate applications in laser surgery, and <i>bona fide</i> applications for laser therapy are also expanding. "Publish, or be damned" is a well-known dictum in the heady halls of academe. Unfortunately, for many of the papers which are submitted on laser applications but which do not reach the pages of the target journal, and indeed for some papers which are published elsewhere by journals which should know a little better, or should at least have done their homework, the saying should perhaps be amended to; "Publish <b>and</b> be damned," meaning that the paper actually do more harm than good to the cause of lasers in medical science.