© 2002 American Thoracic Society
The Journal in 2002Three years have passed since the current editorial team took over the operation of AJRCCM (1). Some readers may feel that the only change has been a more colorful cover and twice-a-month mailing. A few other changes have occurred, and these I will review for you. In our first year, 2000, we experienced an increase of more than 200 submissions (Figure 1) . The unprecedented increase was gratifying because number of submissions is an important measure of the quality of a journal. The publication lag, however, had already been growing because of a constrained page budget (see Figure 5), and the increase in submissions meant we were headed for a publication lag of 10 months or more—defeating the purpose of a journal aiming to publish current research. To prevent this occurrence, the associate editors pushed authors to write more concisely, directing them to decrease text, tables, and figures. We followed the example of journals like Nature, Science, and Circulation Research, and requested authors to move detail out of the print journal and into an Online Only Repository. We also worked with the printers to change the layout of abstracts, tables and figures; this economizing saved several pages per issue.
We changed the Instructions for Contributors in October 2000 (2), and these have since undergone further modifications. We introduced the Web Repository to enable authors to present more detail on experimental methods. Problems in the METHODS section are the main reason that manuscripts are declined for publication in AJRCCM. By presenting additional detail in the Repository, authors can make their manuscripts more competitive. Use of the Repository is no longer confined to methodological detail. It is used increasingly to present tables, figures, additional discussion, as well as material that cannot be shown in the paper journal, such as video clips. Online versions of journals began as poor cousins of the paper journal. Our online copy now presents everything found in the paper copy, and much more. The online copy has become the complete and official version of AJRCCM, and the print copy is simply an abridgement (3). Authors want the widest possible exposure for their work. Total circulation of AJRCCM is about 18,000. This number is more than eight times the circulation of the pulmonary journals of the American Physiological Society. It also compares favorably with the total circulation of 23,200 for Circulation despite the greater number of cardiologists, as compared with pulmonologists or intensivists. Readers accessing the online journal far exceed the total circulation of the paper journal—now averaging over 630,000 hits a month (Figure 2) . Summaries of all the 2000 and 2001 articles are accessible free of charge at the Year in Review site on our Homepage. The taxonomy and hotlinks make it easy to retrieve articles on a particular subject. The high quality of the retrieved articles contrasts markedly with the yield from a conventional search engine, where low-quality articles greatly outnumber high-quality articles.
We introduced online submissions and online peer review in August 2001. Authors and reviewers adapted rapidly (Figure 3) , and we phased out submissions on paper in May 2002. The average time to first decision on a new manuscript is now 33 days (see Figure E1 in the online data supplement), as compared with 90 days or longer with the old system. More important than speed, the online system has made it possible to increase the rigor of peer review (4, 5). We now average four or more reviewers per manuscript as compared with two reviewers in the past.
The request for a Descriptor Number linked to the subject category of a manuscript may seem a trivial change. This requirement, however, carries potential for effecting the greatest improvement in the quality of AJRCCM. The 172 descriptor categories are interlinked with 5,600 reviewers in our online database. The database makes it possible to select reviewers in a more scientific manner than was possible in the past. When an associate editor enters a descriptor number into the database, he or she is immediately presented with a list of reviewers who have the greatest expertise in that scientific subject, accompanied by their record for timeliness and rigor (4, 5). None of the other 190 journals in the ScholarOne system has a database of equivalent depth and sophistication. So when picking a descriptor number for your manuscript, please give the selection careful thought. The descriptor numbers also allow us to measure submissions in different subject categories. The categories receiving the most submissions in 2001 are presented in Figure 4 ; equivalent data for 2000 are presented in Figure E2 of the online data supplement. Articles published in 2000 according to major subject category are shown in Figure E3 of the online data supplement. The number of submissions for each of the 172 categories in 2000 and 2001 are listed in Table E1 of the online data supplement. The data vindicate the decision to broaden the scope of the Journal and embrace all aspects of critical care: this category now receives more manuscripts than asthma and airway biology combined.
Time between acceptance of a manuscript and publication in the Journal is plotted in Figure 5 . When the present editorial team started, the publication lag had increased to almost seven months. Through the introduction of the Web Repository, pushing authors to write more concisely, reformatting the page layout, centralized copyediting, transmitting galley proofs across the Internet, and streamlining within our production unit, the lag has dropped to around three months. Some journals operate a rapid communication section for selected articles. At AJRCCM, we approach all articles as rapid communications. We introduced Articles in Press in July 2002. Manuscripts are posted online within days of acceptance (before they have been edited or proofread), enabling readers to learn of the latest research months before it appears in the paper journal. Lastly, we have eliminated the delays in the mailing of the print journal, which had reached as much as five weeks after the scheduled date. One of the clearest messages in the last ATS Membership Survey was that readers wanted more review articles. In addition to increasing the number of review articles (Figure 6) , we have changed how they are processed (6). Specific guidelines for each type of review article are provided through hypertext links in our Instructions for Contributors, and the evaluation criteria have been changed. Authors send an initial outline, which is evaluated by six or more experts, and the comments are returned to the author in less than a week—a speed of processing inconceivable without e-mail. Completed manuscripts are evaluated by up to six experts and they may go through three or more cycles of assessment. All of these steps have been taken to make review articles in AJRCCM as authoritative as possible.
We introduced a number of new series: How it Really Happened directed at young researchers (7–11), Critical Care Perspectives to complement Pulmonary Perspectives (12–15), Updates in Nonpulmonary Critical Care directed at readers taking recertification examinations (16–20), Rebuttals to make Pro and Con Debates more rounded (21–24), Occasional Essays as a forum for social and health policy issues (25–28), and Year in Review to help readers to keep up with the latest literature (29). Figure 7 is a plot of Letters to the Editor published over the last six years. By providing an opportunity for participant democracy, the number of letters and their content provide a measure of the relevance and vibrancy of a journal (30). We have also broadened our community of readers by making online content free to the developing world. Tuberculosis and AIDS are having a devastating effect in developing countries, and articles on these and other topics in AJRCCM are now free to readers in these countries.
The impact factor over the last ten years is plotted in Figure 8 . The rating of 5.96 for AJRCCM in 2001 is 1.8 units higher than for the next journal in the respiratory system category and 2.4 units higher than for the next journal in the critical care category. The impact factor measures three main qualities of a journal: the relevance of the journal to researchers in an active field of inquiry; the ability of editors to discriminate between the submissions of the highest quality and the next tier; and the speed that the journal publishes articles after acceptance. Impact factor has limitations and many critics, but it remains the most widely used index for measuring the overall performance of a journal (31, 32).
The editor of a journal knows only too well that efforts to improve the quality of a journal may prove little more than a Sisyphean exercise. An editor also learns that little is needed for a journal to rapidly unravel; a reputation that took years to build can be lost in weeks. We approached that situation after the peer review office was moved in September 2000. Authors encountered significant delays in the handling of their manuscripts: 554 manuscripts experienced delays of up to 4 to 5 months. We came through this experience only because of the tremendous loyalty of reviewers to AJRCCM and the trust of authors in the Journal. For this, we are truly thankful. The experience, however, highlights the vulnerability of a journal and its need for vigilant protection. Change is difficult. The changes to AJRCCM operations over the last three years have resulted from our attempting to ride the revolution in communication technology. We know the bumps and stumbles have been frustrating to authors and reviewers. When the dust eventually settles, however, we hope readers will judge it all worthwhile. FOOTNOTES Readers of the online version of AJRCCM will find 11 hypertext links to additional information on issues raised in this editorial. This editorial has an online data supplement, which is accessible from this issue's table of contents online at www.atsjournals.org REFERENCES
This article has been cited by other articles:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
