Quality of articles published in predatory nursing journals

Background: Predatory journals exist in nursing and lack the safeguards of traditional publishing practices.

Purpose: To examine the quality of articles published in predatory nursing journals.

Method: Randomly selected articles (n = 358) were reviewed for structural content and eight quality indicators.

Findings: Two-thirds (67.4%) of the articles were published between 2014 and 2016, demonstrating the acceleration of publications in predatory nursing journals. The majority (75.9%) of the articles were research reports. Most followed the IMRAD presentation of a research report but contained errors, or the study was not pertinent to the nursing discipline.

Conclusions: Nursing research published in predatory journals may appear legitimate by conforming to an expected structure. However, a lack of quality is apparent, representing inadequate peer review and editorial processes. Poor quality research erodes the scholarly nursing literature.