Journal editors impasse with outcome reporting bias

Several requirements and regulations have been issued to promote clinical trial transparency through prospective registration of trials, disclosure of results, access to trial reports submitted to regulatory agencies and access to anonymized patient-level data. Clinical trial results are disseminated through articles. Yet, many present outcome reporting bias. Open access to trial data will help to deter outcome reporting bias. However, this is not enough to clinicians. Access to trial protocols by journal staff has proven rather inefficacious in preventing outcome reporting bias. Two proposals have been suggested or implemented to tackle outcome reporting bias that are discussed in this article. Editors should implement quality-control processes aiming at preventing outcome reporting bias. Readers should be informed as to the efficiency of the implemented process.