Editor's Letter: State of the Journal

Abstract

As the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Ultrasound in Medicine (JUM), I am proud to provide this overview of the state of your journal. Last year (2020), JUM had arguably one of its best years on record, building on its reputation as the leading international educational and scientific journal for all fields of ultrasound. In 2020, JUM saw a significant increase in the number of original manuscript submissions. In fact, it was the first time JUM received more than 1500 submissions, ending the year with 1728—a 31.6% increase over 2019's record. Of course, this increase in submissions meant that JUM had to be more selective. The result is that the acceptance rate dipped to 17%, a record low. When it comes to deciding which articles are accepted, the editors and the article reviewers play a very important role. In addition to being able to immediately reject articles (you would be surprised by how many submitted articles do not even mention ultrasound), the editors select from a vast pool of reviewers to help score the merits of each article. The top reasons most articles are rejected are because they do not substantially add to the literature, they have a flawed study design, or the manuscript has translation issues. Of course, we also reject more articles than we would like because of academic misconduct or plagiarism. I would be remiss if I did not thank the hundreds of individuals who reviewed at least 1 article for JUM last year. While finding reviewers does tend to consume a significant amount of time, we did have some standouts last year. I am proud that 36 individuals reviewed at least 10 articles, 5 reviewed at least 20 articles, and Dr Giovanna Ferraioli reviewed an incredible 60 articles! In 2020, the Advisory Editorial Board completed 34% of all reviews with an average review time of just 9 days. JUM does not succeed without a strong Board, and as you can see, we are in good hands. As mentioned earlier, JUM is truly an international journal, with readership and authorship from across the globe. JUM received at least 10 article submissions from people in each of nearly 20 countries, with writers and researchers from 4 countries submitting at least 100 articles. A little more than one-fifth (20.4%) of all submissions came from the United States. The fact that JUM is global is also shown in the number of digital downloads. From around the world, readers and researchers downloaded 2.5 million articles from the JUM—a 39% increase over 2019. This increase in downloads and readership has also affected other metrics, including the impact factor, which increased to 1.759. In addition, JUM's h-index jumped to 31. This means 31 articles from the JUM were cited at least 31 times. In 2019, that number was 18. Other key metrics also saw improvement in 2020. The time to first decision dropped to 15 days, and the time from acceptance to online publication hit a record low of just 30 days. Just a few years ago, that took 216 days. I want to personally thank those who have made the journal flourish over the last few years, including the Deputy Editors, subspecialty editors, advisory editorial board members, the CME test writers and reviewers, the editorial staff, the peer review management staff, and the production staff. There is one person I want to single out: Bruce Totaro. Most of you do not know Bruce, but I can tell you he is one of the best technical editors on the planet. At the end of last year, after 20 years of working on the JUM, Bruce retired. While we certainly wish him the best of luck, he will be desperately missed. Thank you, Bruce. As you can see, it was an exciting year for JUM, and it took many people to make that happen. As we venture into 2021, there is even more on the horizon, including more focus on Early View articles, new virtual issues, enhancements to the JUM app (that you can find in the Apple App and Google Play stores), and more focused education. I look forward to an even bigger brighter future for JUM with your continued support.