You are here
NIH Public Access Policy
NIH Public Access Policy – PubMed Central (PMC)
What is it?
- A federal U.S. law which ensures that the public has access to the published results of NIH-funded research like CHS. See: U. S. Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2008 (H.R. 2764).
- Requires scientists to submit author-accepted manuscripts that arise from NIH funds to PubMed Central (PMC), a digital archive of full-text biomedical journal papers available online without a fee, upon acceptance.
- NOTE: The NIH updated its Public Access Policy to require that Author Accepted Manuscripts accepted for publication in a journal on or after July 1, 2025 be submitted to PubMed Central upon acceptance for publication, for public availability immediately (without embargo) upon the Official Date of Publication. For more information, please see:
Who is responsible?
- Corresponding authors of peer-reviewed manuscripts that use data from directly-funded NIH studies like CHS and that were accepted after April 7, 2008.
- CHS grantee/contractors: Papers submitted to PMC will be assigned a PMCID that must be cited by the CHS grantee/contractors in all future NIH applications, proposals or progress reports submitted to NIH. If a CHS grantee has failed to materially comply with the terms and conditions of award, NIH may suspend the grant, pending corrective action, or may terminate the grant for cause. In 2013, NIH implemented New Enhanced Compliance measures allowing the Institute to delay processing of non-competing continuation grant awards if publications arising from that award are not in compliance with the NIH public access policy.
- CHS: Our compliance with the NIH PMC Public Access Policy is a legal requirement and a term and condition of our CHS funding awards.
How do I comply?
1. Confirm that the journal’s copyright policy will permit PMC submission. (Before you sign a publication agreement or similar copyright transfer agreement, make sure that the agreement allows your CHS paper to be submitted to NIH in accordance with this NIH Public Access Policy).
2. Determine the appropriate submission method for the journal using the chart below (see Submission Method table below).
3. If the publisher posts the paper directly to PMC upon the official date of publication, you do not need to do anything. If the publisher does not post the paper directly to PMC upon the official date of publication, you need to submit the Author-Accepted Manuscript (AAM) to PMC via NIHMS immediately upon acceptance to a journal. This ensures you have the files readily accessible and allows for manuscript processing times, which may take up to four weeks. For details regarding this submission process, including tips for authors, please see here.
4. Upon deposit to NIHMS or Europe PMC Plus, a manuscript identifier will be assigned. NIH-funded researchers can use the NIHMSID as evidence of compliance for up to three months after the publication of a paper. After that, a PMCID is required. Please notify the CHS Publications Coordinator, Ellen Terry (ecterry@uw.edu), of the NIHMSID and PMCID when they are assigned.
Overview of Submission Methods
|
Version of Paper Submitted |
Final Published Article |
Author-Accepted Manuscript (AAM) |
|---|---|---|
|
Submission Process |
Publisher posts the paper directly to PMC, upon the official date of publication. |
Papers are required to be submitted via the NIHMS upon acceptance for publication. Publishers, authors or their designee deposit files and the NIHMS converts them to the PMC native format. |
|
Approve Submission |
Publisher |
Author, via NIHMS |
|
Approve PMC web version |
Publisher |
Author, via NIHMS |
|
Responsible Party |
NIH Awardee |
NIH Awardee |
|
To cite papers, from acceptance for publication to 3 months post publication |
PMCID or “PMC Journal- In Process” |
PMCID or NIHMSID |
|
To cite papers, 3 months post publication and beyond |
PMCID |
PMCID |