Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Voice Therapy Efficacy hardly exists



So I checked my email this morning and had the email that the image above is from:

Subject: Voice Therapy Resources -- Forthcoming and Bestselling

Just so you know before you buy anything, just type "efficacy" and "voice" in Google. Guess how many efficacious voice therapies there are? 1! UNO! ONE! ...and it is for persons with Parkinson's disease! So does that mean one shouldn't trust a vocologist and not get voice therapy? No, I am just saying, why should I buy a new book about techniques that have been out for years but have not been shown yet to be Efficacious?

Wednesday, April 2, 2008

Journal Fishing

Ok, I need to set this one up. I want to coin a new phrase... Journal Fishing

Main Entry: jour·nal
Pronunciation: \ˈjər-nəl\
Function: noun
Definition [one of the definitions]
a periodical dealing especially with matters of current interest

Main Entry: fishing
Function: transitive verb
Definition [one of the definitions]
to engage in a search by groping or feeling


MY NEW DEFINITION
Main Entry: jour·nal fishing
Pronunciation: \ˈjər-nəl\ \ˈfi-shiŋ\
Definition [my definition]
to engage in
a search for a journal to submit a previously rejected manuscript


Commentary:
I recently was asked to review an article from a journal that I had not heard of before. As I started reading the article, I recognized it as similar to one I had reviewed a year or so ago that I had reviewed as needing major revisions (I also gave several issues that needed to be addressed). Well, the more I read, the more it was not only similar but was identical. When I did a 'compare documents', the main difference was the abstract. The authors didn't even attempt to address any of the issues I had. They, instead, just went Journal Fishing. Even more sad is that the corresponding author is an upstanding and well known researcher in the field.
Google