A series of articles from a group of the great and the good in clinical research methodology and design. (Including Iain Chalmers and John Ioannidis). They all seem to be open access, and make some very important points and good suggestions, that I can only hope will be followed.

Chalmers I, Bracken MB, Djulbegovic B, Garattini S, Grant J, Gülmezoglu AM, Howells DW, Ioannidis JPA, Oliver S: How to increase value and reduce waste when research priorities are set. The Lancet 2014, 383(9912):156-165.

Ioannidis JPA, Greenland S, Hlatky MA, Khoury MJ, Macleod MR, Moher D, Schulz KF, Tibshirani R: Increasing value and reducing waste in research design, conduct, and analysis. The Lancet 2014, 383(9912):166-175.

Salman RA-S, Beller E, Kagan J, Hemminki E, Phillips RS, Savulescu J, Macleod M, Wisely J, Chalmers I: Increasing value and reducing waste in biomedical research regulation and management. The Lancet 2014, 383(9912):176-185.

There is a striking picture of a researcher standing behind the pile of papers submitted to a regulatory committee (which I must admit was a much more complex undertaking than most research, but is a cute illustration of an extreme version of what we have to deal with).

The articles are certainly not all about how to reduce paperwork, but also how to improve the relevance and the quality of research.