In 2025, APC reviewers continue to make outstanding contributions to the peer review process. They demonstrated professional effort and enthusiasm in their reviews and provided comments that genuinely help the authors to enhance their work.
Hereby, we would like to highlight some of our outstanding reviewers, with a brief interview of their thoughts and insights as a reviewer. Allow us to express our heartfelt gratitude for their tremendous effort and valuable contributions to the scientific process.
Makoto Onji, Kitakyushu Municipal Medical Center, Japan
Arthur Winer, Inova Schar Cancer Institute, USA
Makoto Onji
Makoto Onji works at Department of Rehabilitation as the Deputy Chief Physical Therapist of Kitakyushu Municipal Medical Center, Japan since 2019. His research covers Cancer Rehabilitation (Pancreatic Cancer, Hematologic Malignancies), Pulmonary Rehabilitation, and Intensive Care Rehabilitation. He was Respiratory Specialist, Physical Therapist and Certified Respiratory Physical Therapist of Japan Physical Therapy Association. He is delegate of Japan Physical Therapists Association and Director of Academic Journal Editorial Department in Fukuoka Physical Therapists Association. He is also the Academic Conference Chairman in 2025 Fukuoka Prefecture Physical Therapy Conference. Dr. Onji engages in rehabilitation work for patients during the day. He conducts clinical research and energetically presents at conferences and writes papers. Peer-review work is carried out little by little using early mornings on weekdays and holidays.
In Dr. Onji’s opinion, clinical researchers have difficulty finding time to do peer review. Therefore, such a system that spotlights reviewers like Reviewer of the Month will produce high-quality reviewers. Reviewers' subjective judgments are also significant. An efficient peer-review system and objectification of review are desirable.
“Reviews help authors to better present their work to the scientific community. I improved my submitted papers through the constructive feedback of reviewers. Their suggestions will guide me in my next research. Reviewers are best allies of the authors. Not only doctors but also medical staff are working hard on articles and peer-review work,” says Dr. Onji.
(by Lareina Lim, Brad Li)
Arthur Winer
Arthur Winer, MD, is a gastrointestinal medical oncologist at Inova Schar Cancer Institute in Fairfax, Virginia. He is a clinical researcher and trialist, and has an interest in the treatment of older adults with GI malignancies. He has an accruing clinical trial evaluating a novel strategy to reduce the amount of chemotherapy they give older patients with metastatic pancreatic cancer (NCT05360732), the results of which are eagerly awaited. He is also interested in repurposing old medications in new ways to treat cancer and has written several trials looking at an Alzheimer drug memantine in the treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma which are now active (NCT06007846; NCT06789757). He hopes these trials will make meaningful progress to help patients with these difficult illnesses. Learn more about Dr. Winer here.
Dr. Winer reckons that the peer-review system is brilliant in concept but with many limitations. Often, a busy researcher is being asked to take some of their limited time to review an article, often at their own expense without compensation. He is often bombarded with requests to review articles on an almost daily basis, and has to be discerning in how many he agrees to evaluate. He expects to see a system implemented that valued the reviewers’ time in a more meaningful and objective way, such as by carving out specific protected time to provide reviews or by carefully and objectively compensating reviewers directly for their invaluable work.
When going into a review, Dr. Winer always tries to ensure that he knows as little as possible about the authors to avoid a conflict of interest, and prefers to be blinded to authorship whenever possible. He tries to choose papers to review that are clearly within his realm of expertise and to dedicate his time to each review to avoid anchoring bias and not solely rely on his first impression in analysing the article. Performing his initial review and then revisiting the article later also helps him critically analyse the manuscript and ensure he is not judging it too quickly.
“I would recommend that each time you start to review an article you take a minute to empathize with the authors who submitted their work for publication. In some ways they are baring their soul and it is important to remember that many hours of work went into the manuscript sitting before you. I find that taking a moment to actively recognize that fact helps me read the article more objectively and provide more constructive and meaningful feedback,” says Dr. Winer.
(by Lareina Lim, Brad Li)
