The journal's performance in 2011

Abstract

At the close of the year and of Volume 33 of the Revista Brasileira de Hematologia e Hemoterapia (RBHH) several significant changes deserve reflection and considerations. The first change this year was that the journal was printed in English. There was almost unanimous agreement about this decision. Even so, one or two colleagues contacted me and said they believed that this measure was inapt and even unpatriotic. This theme has been debated for some time, even among journal editors at events of the Associacao Brasileira de Editores Cientificos (ABEC). Since 2002, in its instructions for authors, the RBHH has stated that it is a bilingual journal; papers in Portuguese or English would be published and so the choice of language has always depended on the author. The times have changed and in recent years the country changed with greater participation in the global scientific market as was reported in previous issues.(1) Concurrently the academic pressure for authors' visibility has increased and the Qualis scientific journal classification system of the Coordenacao de Apoio aos Profissionais do Ensino Superior (CAPES) implanted four years ago was a fatal blow for many national journals and authors, alike.(2,3) Editorial staff felt that their work was devalued and the authors were discouraged because their contributions were given low scores with a direct impact on the productivity factor of professors and researchers. Since then the quest for visibility has become a mantra of all editors and the pursuit of the internationalization of journals has become a national goal. At this point ABEC and the Associacao Medica Brasileira (AMB) issued clear signals that it is essential to implement changes. Among which is the internationalization of the editorial board, with the participation of foreign experts in journals; this is one of the main demands for journals to become indexed to the Institute for Scientific Information Web of Knowledge/Journal Citation Reports (ISI/JCR) and PubMed/Medline electronic databases. And at this time both printed and electronic journals need to be edited in English. Thus, recent publications and events such as those of the Fundacao de Amparo a Pesquisas do Estado de Sao Paulo (FAPESP) and of the Scientific Electronic Library Online (SciELO) have been stimulating journals to publish in English on the grounds that English should be considered technical, frank and the most important or even the only international language. FAPESP recommends, albeit inexplicitly, that English be used for national publications if the objective is to reach international audiences. Publish, be read and cited or perish. This is the key. So today, on filling out disclosure documents, such as requests for financial support for the journal there is always the question of whether the journal is published in English. So the RBHH started to be printed in English, and because of this it was indexed in PubMed Central (PMC) of the National Institutes of Health, an auspicious achievement in 2011. Volume 33 will be indexed in PMC in full thereby providing international visibility to all authors. Another accomplishment this year was a 20% increase in submissions, a fact that comforts us as it shows that the changes have been accepted not only in respect to our attempts at internationalization but also in respect to measures implemented on the quality of print and the scientific rigor used in the evaluation of submissions. So, in line with policies of the Associacao Brasileira de Hematologia e Hemoterapia (ABHH) and affiliated societies [Sociedade Brasileira de Transplante de Medula Ossea (SBTMO), Associacao Italo-Brasileira de Hematologia (AIBE) and Sociedade Brasileira de Oncologia Pediatrica (SOBOPE)] the RBHH is becoming internationalized and fulfilling its role as representative of the Brazilian hematology community with the aim of becoming an alternative for the international scientific communities.