Skip to Main Content

NIH Public Access Policy : Monitoring Compliance

Create and Link a "My Bibliography" account to ERA Commons

My Bibliography is a tool available within My NCBI, which you can sign up to use through PubMed for free. My Bibliography allows you to save references to your own publications by either exporting from PubMed or entering manually. My Bibliography also syncs with your eRA Commons account, allowing you to see whether your publications comply with the NIH Public Access Policy.

If you do not already have a "MyNCBI" account:

  1. Go to Pubmed.
  2. Click “Sign into MyNCBI.”
  3. If you have an eRA Commons Account sign in using the “NIH Login” with your eRA Commons username and password.
  4. Your eRA Commons account is now linked with your MyNCBI account.

If you already have a "MyNCBI" account:

  1. Go to Pubmed.
  2. Click “Sign into MyNCBI.”
  3. Sign in using your MyNCBI username and password.
  4. Access the Accounts setting page by clicking on the Hyperlink of your name at the top right corner.
  5. Go to “Linked Account” and click on change.
  6. In the box entitled “Login Account Options” scroll down to the “NIH & eRA Commons” option and click on it.
  7. Login to your eRA commons account to link the accounts.

Need Help?

Compliance

New Compliance Documentation Requirements

All NIH funded researchers MUST meet the following new requirements:

  1. Create a My NCBI account that is linked to your eRA Commons account.
  2. Within My NCBI, add ALL of your NIH funded publications to My Bibliography.
    • Add all articles that resulted from funding that you are a PI for, even if you are not an author.
    • Add peer-reviewed articles from research funded by NIH, even if they are NOT in PubMed.
  3. Monitor your compliance with the NIH Public Access policy in My Bibliography by using the "Awards" display.
  4. Address articles marked with a Red dot or Question mark, edit the status of articles, add grants, and start submission process by clicking links next to the article.
  5. Generate Research Performance Progress Reports from My Bibliography.

"My Bibliography" Status Terms/Definitions

Not Defined:

question mark

A question mark indicates that compliance with the NIH Public Access Policy cannot be determined without additional information. Click on the question mark icon or the "Edit Status" link to enter supporting information for the citation. 

 

Non-Compliant:

red dot

  Public Access Compliance: Non-compliant. No PMCID 3 months post publication. [Edit Status] NIHMS ID: NIHMS343954

A red dot indicates that the article is non-compliant. The compliance process can be started by clicking on the red dot or “Citation not in NIHMS or PMC.” NIH funding information (award id) can be added to this citation by clicking “Add or delete award.”

 

Public Access Compliant:

yellow dot

A yellow dot means that the citation has been submitted to the NIH Manuscript Submission system and is considered in process.

green dot

A green dot indicates that the citation is compliant with the NIH Public Access Policy. Note that the PMCID number displays in this status. 

green dot

Articles that were accepted for publication prior to April 7, 2008 are not covered by the NIH Public Access Policy. These citations will be marked as N/A for Not Applicable (this status is also automatically applied to citation types that are not journal articles, e.g., book chapters, patents, presentations).