WRITING IN SCIENCE

Internet Enduring Material Sponsored by the Stanford University School of Medicine. Presented by the Departments of Medical Education and Health Research at Stanford University School of Medicine.

Many physicians and medical researchers have not had a formal training in scientific writing and have not had mentors in their professional setting to assist them with improving this skill. Scientific writing is an important skill enabling effective disseminating of medical knowledge, clear communication and obtaining grant funding. This course seeks to improve skills in scientific writing as it applies to publishing clear and effective scientific papers and reviewing clinical research.

This course was repurposed from the original MOOC titled Writing in the Sciences that was given over several weeks. This course is self-paced and provides all material at the same time.

This course is designed to meet the educational needs of an international audience of physicians, residents and medical researchers in all specialties. 

• Release Date: May 1, 2015
• Expiration Date: April 30, 2018
• Estimated Time to Complete: 20 Hours
• CME Credits Offered: 20.00
• CME Processing Fee: $20

• Review the information below and complete the entire activity
  • Complete the CME post-test, CME assessment survey, and attestation question at the end of the activity
  • You must receive a score of 75% or higher on the 30-question post-test in order to receive a certificate. You will have two attempts to answer each multiple-choice question (or one attempt for questions with only two options) to pass the post-test.
  • Once you attest to completing the entire online activity and have scored 75% or higher on the post-test, your certificate will be generated automatically and will be available on your Dashboard page.
  • Physicians will be awarded AMA PRA Category 1 Credits™. All other participants will receive a Certificate of Participation.

* Participation in the discussion forum and content marked optional is not certified for AMA PRA Category 1 Credit™

• At the conclusion of this activity, participants should be able to:
  • Develop skills to write clear and interesting research papers that demonstrate the ability to: develop the abstract, introduction, content including methods and the results using good style and grace.
  • Develop strategies to apply principles of effective writing as it pertains to reviewing and publishing peer review papers.

Module 1: Principles of effective writing (cut the clutter)
Module 2: Principles of effective writing (verbs)
Module 3: Crafting better sentences and paragraphs
Module 4: Organization; and streamlining the writing process
Module 5: The format of an original manuscript
Module 6: Reviews, commentaries, and opinion pieces; and the publication process
Module 7: Issues in scientific writing (plagiarism, authorship, ghostwriting, reproducible research) 
Module 8: How to do a peer review; and how to communicate with the lay public

• The following planners, speakers and authors have indicated that they have no relationships with industry to disclose relative to the content of this activity:
  • Charles Prober, MD
    Senior Associate Dean, Medical Education
    Stanford School of Medicine
    Course Director
  • Kristin Sainani, PhD
    Clinical Assistant Professor
    Health Research and Policy
    Co-Course Director
    Author/Presenter
• The following presenters have no relationships with industry relative to the content of this activity:
  • Eran Bendavid, MD
    Assistant Professor of Medicine
    Stanford University
  • Kit Delgado, MD
    Instructor of Emergency Medicine
    Stanford University
  • Bradley Efron, MD
    Professor of Statistics and of Health Research and Policy
    Stanford University
  • Gary Friedman, MD
    Consulting Professor in Health Research and Policy
    Stanford University
  • George Lundberg, MD
    Consulting Professor in Health Research and Policy
    Stanford University
  • Crystal Smith-Spangler, MD
    Instructor of Medicine,
    Stanford University

• Mike McAuliffe
  Stanford EdTech
• Greg Bruhns
  Stanford Online

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The Stanford University School of Medicine is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) to provide continuing medical education for physicians.

The Stanford University School of Medicine designates this enduring material for a maximum of 20.00 AMA PRA Category 1 Credits™. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

This activity received no commercial support.

California Assembly Bill 1195 requires continuing medical education activities with patient care components to include curriculum in the subjects of cultural and linguistic competency. It is the intent of the bill, which went into effect July 1, 2006, to encourage physicians and surgeons, CME providers in the State of California and the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education to meet the cultural and linguistic concerns of a diverse patient population through appropriate professional development. The planners and speakers of this CME activity have been encouraged to address cultural issues relevant to their topic area. The Stanford University School of Medicine Multicultural Health Portal also contains many useful cultural and linguistic competency tools including culture guides, language access information and pertinent state and federal laws.

You are encouraged to visit the portal: http://lane.stanford.edu/portals/cultural.html

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If you are having technical problems (video freezes or is unplayable, can't print your certificate, etc.) you can submit a Help Request to the OpenEdX Team. If you have questions related to CME credit, requirements (Pre-test, Post-test, Evaluation, Attestation) or course content, you can contact the CME Online support team at cmeonline@stanford.edu

1. Inouye SK, Fiellin DA. An Evidence-Based Guide to Writing Grant Proposals for Clinical Research. Ann Intern Med. 2005;142(4):274-282.
2. Hayes DP. The Growing Inaccessibility of Science. Nature. 1992; 356(6372): 739-740.
3. Tobin MJ. Compliance (COMmunicate PLease wIth Less Abbreviations, Noun Clusters, and Exclusiveness). Am J Respir Crit Care Med. 2002;166(12 Pt 1):1534-1536.
4. Walling A, Shapiro J, Ast T. What Makes a Good Reflective Paper? Fam Med. 2013;45(1):7-12.
5. Kotsis SV, Chung KC. A Guide for Writing in the Scientific Forum. Plast Reconstr Surg. 2010; 126(5):1763–1771.