Peer review is the evaluation of work by one or more people of similar competence to the producers of the work (peers). It constitutes a form of self-regulation by qualified members of a profession within the relevant
field. Peer review methods are employed to maintain standards of quality, improve performance, and provide credibility. In
academia peer review is often used to determine an
academic paper's suitability for publication.
Peer review can be categorized by the type of activity and by the field or profession in which the activity occurs. For example,
medical peer review can refer to
clinical peer review, or the peer evaluation of clinical teaching skills for both physicians and nurses, or scientific peer review of journal articles, or to a secondary round of peer review for the clinical value of articles concurrently published in
medical journals.
Moreover, "
medical peer review" has been used by the
American Medical Association to refer not only to the process of improving quality and safety in health care organizations, but also to the process of rating clinical behavior or compliance with professional society membership standards. Thus, the terminology has poor standardization and specificity, particularly as a database search term.