Editorial

Abstract

Reporting guidelines and research frameworksTo make international scientific communication more efficient, research articles and other scientific publications should be complete, concise and clear (EASE, 2018).Established tools to achieve these are reporting guidelines for different types of research as well as research design.Over the last 20 years, more than 400 reporting guidelines have been developed, with some of them being regularly updated (Caulley et al., 2020).They help authors, peer reviewers and journal editors to improve transparency and accessibility of research, as well as to reduce research waste by making it more reproducible (Logullo et al., 2020), but also making it obvious as to what research has taken place to avoid duplication.More importantly, it helps reporting of research in such a manner that it protects both the authors and publishers of such research in avoiding potential unethical practices within both study design and the reporting of results.Such guidelines also aid literature reviewing, where comparing research methods, strengths and weaknesses of research etc. is vital.Completeness of reporting is also potentially associated with higher citation counts (Vilar o et al., 2019).Many initiators of guidelines exist, and it shows that we are heading in the right direction by making research more transparent.A leading international initiative supporting the development and application of reporting guidelines is the EQUATOR (Enhancing the QUAlity and Transparency Of health Research) Networkan "umbrella" organization that brings together researchers, medical journal editors, peer reviewers, developers of reporting guidelines, research funding bodies and other collaborators with mutual interest in improving the quality of research publications and of research itself.They define a research reporting guideline as a checklist, flow diagram or structured text to guide authors in reporting a specific type of research, developed using an explicit methodology, which presents a clear list of reporting items that should appear in a paper and explains how the list was developed.The EQUATOR Library contains a comprehensive database of reporting guidelines that can be searched by study design, by specialty and by section of report (EQUATOR.Search for reporting guidelines).This editorial reports the findings of an analysis of published articles from the last seven issues of the International Journal of Health Governance (IJHG) (Vol.25, issues 1-4, and Vol.26, issues 1-3).From 47 papers included in our analysis, only four (8.5%) stated using and actually followed specific reporting guidelines (PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) and PRISMA extention for scoping reviews).Among 157 highly cited guidelines for health research, PRISMA is in fact the most cited (Caulley et al., 2020).Amongst many other consensus-based guidelines for reporting research that could guide authors submitting to IJHG are STROBE (The Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies in Epidemiology) for observational studies, CARE (CAse REports) for case reports, COREQ (Consolidated criteria for reporting qualitative research) for qualitative research, SQUIRE for quality improvement studies, SQUIRE-EDU (Standards for QUality Improvement Reporting Excellence -Health Professions Education) for educational improvement studies, CHEERS (Consolidated Health Economic Evaluation Reporting Standards) for health economic evaluations, STARE-HI (Statement on reporting of evaluation studies in Health Informatics) for evaluation studies in health informatics and RAMESES (Realist And Meta-narrative Evidence Syntheses: Evolving Standards) for realist evaluation in the assessment of complex interventions.In their requirements for the article's methods section, many reporting guidelines recommend to elaborate on which descriptive or theoretical frameworks and models the

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