Reviews and Perspectives

Abstract

The Canadian Journal of Psychiatry (The CJP) has a mandate to report scientific findings and to present them in a way that illuminates theory and practice of psychiatry in Canada and internationally. The medical literature is expanding rapidly. Nearly a million papers were indexed by MEDLINE in 2012—a doubling during the past 10 years. Review articles are essential for keeping up to date with this ever-expanding evidence base. To this end, The CJP has published, for some years now, a mixture of narrative and systematic reviews of the literature (including the In Review section that leads off each issue, along with a Guest Editorial) as well as original research. At this point, the Editorial Board would like to expand the journal’s mandate for reviewing research with important clinical implications. Therefore, the Editorial Board is introducing 2 relatively new sections to The CJP. The first, Systematic Reviews, will replace the older category of Review Papers. Our new Systematic Reviews will be focused investigations that seek to identify, appraise, select, and synthesize all high-quality research evidence relevant to a specific research question. The second, Perspectives, is one The CJP has used only occasionally. Our new Perspective papers will introduce a critical perspective on scientific issues that are controversial. While the Editorial Board has, by and large, avoided publishing opinion pieces, we, as a board, believe there is a role for papers that not only are strongly evidence-based but also take sides in a controversy. We believe these changes will make the journal livelier, and we invite submissions that meet these criteria. The CJP will continue to combine the invited In Review series on large topics with Original Research papers, with unsolicited manuscripts averaging 9.5 months from submission to publication in 2013, with peer-review comments being shared with authors less than 1.7 months after submission. These manuscript types are included in the updated Instructions for Authors, which is available online at http://www.TheCJP.ca and http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/cjp. New for 2014 is a Manuscript Checklist, which will allow authors to ensure they meet The CJP’s requirements and, in turn, to avoid potentially delaying publication of their manuscripts. As well, the new Manuscript Template includes useful tips on preparing manuscripts, which the Editorial Board hopes will make manuscript preparation faster and easier, particularly for junior researchers. We would like to take this opportunity to thank the Editorial Board, as well as our peer reviewers and book reviewers, all of whom work hard for The CJP without compensation. We would also like to thank Roger Bland, who has been Deputy Editor under 3 different editors-in-chief. Finally, we are grateful to our staff, most particularly our indispensable Director, Scientific Publications, Virginia St-Denis. Virginia is aided by Christine Jensen, Sylvia Pollard, Candace Taylor, Smita Hamzeh, and Elizabeth Payne. The Canadian Psychiatric Association’s new Chief Executive Officer, Glenn Brimacombe, has been immensely supportive.