Chart 1.

Recommended Format for Assessment of Scientific Contributions for a Biostatistician^a

Type of activity	Check if yes	Sample comments
Design activities
Major: Substantive input into the overall design of the research protocol or grant application.		Convinced me that the aims did not hold together as a package, so we revised the aims along the lines suggested. Changed the basic design of the study, reducing many of the feasibility concerns we had.
Moderate: Writing one or more specialist sections of the research protocol or grant application.		Wrote statistical material (sample size) and analysis plans. Material was well integrated into the specific aims.
Minor: Overall critical review to sharpen a research protocol and grant application before submission, without major substantive changes.		Reviewed the whole grant we had prepared and suggested ways to make the grant more compelling. Pointed out that some of the material was confusing and suggested ways to fix this and made the steps more actionable.
Implementation activities
Major: Regular (ongoing) participation in study meetings with the study team including primary investigator.		Provided input and comments on a range of issues including recruitment problems during the start-up phase, and a sudden increase in dropouts after one of the coordinators quit. Worked with us through four substantive protocol amendments during the course of the study.
#x02003;Moderate: Implementation of data collection, data management, and quality control activities.		Supervised the staff doing data entry and data management, and those that created our study database. Prompted by the statistician’s query, the data management staff identified some issues while the study was on-going, leading to retraining all the coordinators.
Minor: Advising only on specific issues when requested by the principal investigator.		Gave us good advice when we were having recruitment issues. Discussed problems maintaining high continuation rate.
Analysis activities
Major: Planning and directing the analyses.		Developed statistical analysis plan, supervised staff doing the analysis, planned subsequent analyses based on the results we had. Developed the analysis plan for several spin-off papers from the project.
Moderate: Preparing written material summarizing the results of the analyses and/or preparing formal reports.		We received a very clear and comprehensive summary of the results, so it was straightforward to write the paper. The summary prepared included some basic tables which we adopted for the manuscript.
Minor: Performing the analyses.^b		During the meeting, the analyses needed for the manuscript were done. Emailed us the analyses we had requested.
Manuscript reporting activities		•
Major: Substantive input into the overall organization and presentation of the manuscript.		Prepared the first draft of the results section, prepared the statistical methods section, dealt with reviewer issues about the analysis. Convinced us to include specific supplementary tables which the reviewer commented as a strength of the paper.
Moderate: Preparation of statistical material for manuscript.		Wrote the statistical methods section. Suggested ways to improve the presentation of results, including changing several of the primary tables.
Moderate: Assistance with preparation of rebuttal and resubmission.		After rejection, advised us on additional analyses and helped us prepare a submission to the journal, which published the paper.^b Helped us to respond to reviewer comments about the analysis which we had done.
Minor: Critical review of the manuscript.		Reviewed final manuscript, helped clarify some of results and wording of conclusions.

Adapted in part from Parker RA, Berman NG. Criteria for authorship for statisticians in medical papers. Stat Med. 1998;17:2289-99.

The extent of the analysis could raise this to a major contribution.