Examples
Worked examples
- Is an instance
An industry-employed medical writer named in acknowledgements as 'Editorial support was provided by X (employer), funded by Y'
Counter-examples
Looks similar, but isn't
- Not an instance
A medical writer who drafted the entire manuscript but is not disclosed (ghostwriting — a violation, not a contribution category)
Editorial commentary
Medical writing assistance covers professional help drafting, restructuring, or language-polishing a biomedical manuscript, provided by someone whose primary role is writing rather than research. Good Publication Practice (GPP 2022) requires this assistance to be disclosed by the writer’s name, affiliation, and funding source in every case — the disclosure requirement applies whether or not the writer’s contribution rises to authorship.
How it differs from related terms: A medical writer whose input is substantive enough to meet CRediT’s Writing — original draft or Writing — review & editing role and all four ICMJE criteria should be listed as an author; where the input is narrower, disclosed acknowledgement with the funding source stated is the correct alternative. Undisclosed medical-writing help — where a writer drafts substantial content and is never named — is ghostwriting, a research-integrity violation rather than a legitimate contribution category; see ghost authorship.
The distinction from general AI-assisted writing is the same disclosure logic applied to a tool instead of a person — both require transparent attribution, but AI tools cannot be listed as CRediT contributors or authors under current publisher policy.
References
- Good Publication Practice GPP 2022 (DeTora et al., Annals of Internal Medicine)
- European Medical Writers Association (EMWA) guidelines
Also known as
Professional medical writer · Medical writing assistance
Machine-readable encodings
Use in your systems
<role vocab="credit"
vocab-identifier="https://casrai.org/dictionary/"
vocab-term="Medical writer contribution"
vocab-term-identifier="https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/medical-writer-contribution" />{
"@context": "https://schema.org",
"@type": "DefinedTerm",
"@id": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/medical-writer-contribution",
"name": "Medical writer contribution",
"identifier": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/medical-writer-contribution",
"description": "Professional writing assistance to drafting a biomedical manuscript by a person whose primary role is writing rather than research — including drafting, restructuring, language polishing, and preparing submission — disclosed transparently per Good Publication Practice (GPP) guidelines.",
"inDefinedTermSet": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/domain/credit-extensions#set",
"url": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/medical-writer-contribution",
"alternateName": [
"Professional medical writer",
"Medical writing assistance"
],
"license": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/",
"publisher": {
"@id": "https://casrai.org/#organization"
},
"author": {
"@id": "https://casrai.org/#editorial-team"
},
"datePublished": "2026-05-21T01:58:49",
"dateModified": "2026-09-05T17:30:36",
"inLanguage": "en-GB",
"isAccessibleForFree": true
}
