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Research for USMLE


Hey guys! Hope everyone's doing well. Quite a few people messaged me inquiring for research, so i thought of making a post.

Long post ahead.

When doing research:
You can do research, regardless of being an undergrad or post grad, doesn't matter.
The earlier you start doing it, the better. You can approach any professor/senior or anyone u know is into research and start working on a publication.
Before you approach any researcher, its better to have ground knowledge of research. So that your able to make a good impact on the researcher and also for the reason that NO ONE is going to spoon feed you from the beginning. You have the internet at your fingertips, use it wisely.

There are various types of research. Ranging from:
  1. Meta Analysis (Greatest Value)
  2. Cohort ( " )
  3. Cross Sectional.
  4. Case Series.
  5. Case Control.
  6. Case Report.
  7. Editorial (Least Value)

First decide a topic you want to research on. Then do literature review (looking up articles of your selected topic on the net). Secondly you'll have to make a research proposal, that'll include, your rationale, aim, objective, target audience, methodology etc.The proposal is basically a summary of how you are going to conduct your research. The research proposal is necessary to obtain an ERC Certificate/Approval. Now whats an ERC? An ERC (Ethical Review Committee) is a board that goes through your research proposal and decides if the research is eligible enough to be granted an approval, so that the research may proceed forward. Without an ERC u cannot do research, as when u submit your research to a journal for publication, they'll ask u for the ERC approval document. Once you get your ERC approval, you can proceed with your research to completion.

When selecting a journal for publication:
Now when you're done with your research, you'll have to send it over to a journal for publication. You'll have to select the journal wisely. The journal needs to have some reliable indexing, such as, Google scholar, Cross ref, Scopus, Scimago, PubMed. The more the indexing, the greater is the authenticity of the journal. The value of a journal can be determined by its indexing (What ive mentioned above) and impact factor. Now whats an impact factor? The impact factor (IF) is a measure of the frequency with which the average article in a journal has been cited in a particular year. It is used to measure the importance or rank of a journal by calculating the times it's articles are cited. For example, if there's Journal A and people doing research take reference articles from journal A during their literature review. The more the articles cited from journal A, the more will be the impact factor/authenticity of journal A. Impact factor, in simple, is the rating of a journal.
Publication is often costly, specially when you're opting for high ranked journals. BUT you can also opt for journals that publish FREE OF COST, such as, InfezMed. The journals taking no publication fee, often tend to be more competitive, as they r taking no funds from you, so they want quality publications in their journal.
Some top ranked journals: BMC, BMJ, JMCR, LANCET, HINDAWI and the list goes on.

General Research Stuff you should know:

Here's ICMJE's guidelines for authors/Co Authors /researchers. Look up the link below: http://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/roles-and-responsibilities/defining-the-role-of-authors-and-contributors.html

A brief overview of basic research terminologies: Look up the PDF below (Research Basics).

Regardless of whatever point you are, its alright. Better late than never. Get in touch with researchers/seniors around you and start working on a research. It doesn't matter if the article type or journal of publication aren't that high ranked. What matters is a research publication in an INDEXED journal. The more the merrier.

I may have missed out some points/details or mentioned something incorrectly, apologies in advance for that. If you find something incorrect, please correct me. This was a very brief overview of research, just to give u guys an idea how to go about it. I've mentioned stuff keeping in mind the questions asked from me and information that you might all benefit from.
No favors asked. Please remember me in your prayers!
Good Luck and well wishes to all
https://lookaside.fbsbx.com/file/Research%20Basics.pdf?token=AWwxqSRU1kzgFPnFHOfC5kilyKpzHRB3CPPVRYZySHWFu-RPJHwaIUM3oWFObN799V5GyhTmKnUkk9fvQnauYwUYgghwOeqHsehWGmtsJvf1CuSPCWIcp-_9wdthj0ZsrZ8mtZvXdWad1YYk14f-P2cggASJln5U4eyZtT-NxO8smQ

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