Editorial

Abstract

We had a very useful editorial meeting in London in October 2012. A number of major changes to the Journal were agreed. First, we have decided to stop publishing case reports. As readers know we have been producing them online to save hard copy but now feel that we should abandon them altogether as they are not of great educational value and still require quite a lot of reviewer and editorial time to produce. We know that they are useful for young doctors to learn the art and science of writing papers so we do this with some regret. Authors can still send their case reports to the case report journals that are now widely available. Details of this are in the Instructions to Authors. The case reports that we have already reviewed and accepted have been published online and are citeable; their titles will be listed in the contents of the print issue. Those case reports that are currently in the review process will be published if accepted. We agreed to change the editorial system so that we will have three people who will be designated as associate editors. They are Piet Hoebeke, Tony Herndon and Mark Woodward. They will continue to carry out the duties that they performed as assistant editors but also have more responsibility for managing particular issues and we hope that in time they will be in a position to take over from us as editors. We are trying to ensure that we are in a position to have a seamless transition of editors as it becomes necessary. We are delighted to announce that Antonio Macedo from São Paulo has agreed to become an assistant editor and Pedro-José Lòpez from Santiago, Chile has agreed to take over Antonio's role on the editorial board. The ESPU Board will be meeting in December and will make recommendations for assistant editors. Yves Heloury who works in Melbourne has also agreed to be an assistant editor which means that the geographical spread of editors is much wider. The Far East remains a priority. We are delighted to say that our page budget is increasing in 2013, and this measure, together with no longer publishing case reports, will significantly reduce the time taken for papers to be published in hard copy. The Editors have recognized a developing discipline involving population health, comparative effectiveness and health services research. This is an area in which there is a growing body of pediatric urologists with the specialized training in the methodologies necessary to study and report these trends in our practices and how we deliver both quality and efficiency in our care of children. We are therefore establishing a subsection of the Journal devoted to this subspecialty and have appointed to be an assistant editor with this as his responsibility. We hope to have the first subsection published in an issue in the summer 2013. Regarding the Fetal Section, the Journal is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. Chris Cooper as the new assistant editor. Dr. Cooper has served on the executive committee of the Society for Fetal Urology for over 10 years and with this experience we know will serve our Journal well. Another change within this section will see the addition of Dr. Jeff Campbell to the editorial board, accompanying Dr. Hiep (Bob) Nguyen from the SFU. We are excited to be presenting three fetal manuscripts in this issue that cover bladder exstrophy, posterior urethral valves and ureteroceles. We listed the names of reviewers of papers in the December issue of the Journal together with our thanks for all their hard work. Without their help we would not be able to produce a Journal at all. The following people have been nominated the top ten reviewers for the past year based on the number of papers they reviewed, and the quality and speed of the reviews. Thank you all very much. Tom de Jong, Andrew Baird, Seref Etker, Dominic Frimberger, Katja Wolffenbuttel, Goedele Beckers, Martin Koyle, Robert de Gier, Henrik Steinbrecher and Hiep Nguyen. They will each be sent a certificate and a small token of appreciation recognizing their achievement and our thanks. We would also like to thank Henry Spilberg, Annette Fowler, Emma Pendle and Priscilla Goldby who all work for Elsevier and this Journal. Without their hard work and patience with us and our incompetence we would not be able to produce a Journal that is of such quality and we think high publishing standards. We have a wide variety of topics discussed in this issue with vesico-ureteric reflux and its treatment as usual playing a prominent role. We hope you enjoy this issue.