Transitions and Change

Abstract

This issue of the Journal of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery (JOMS) is the first to more fully reflect the change in leadership that began with my appointment as the new editor-in-chief last fall. Change can be a tricky matter, especially when the thing being modified is an internationally respected, peer-reviewed, scientific/clinical journal. The JOMS is a storied institution with traditions of excellence and forward thinking. Remarkable individuals have held the position of editor-in-chief, such as James Haward and Dan Laskin. A gifted intellectual, Leon Assael, took our journal to new heights with increasing the number of published papers, a smooth negotiation of the complex transition to electronic submission and peer-review, and marked improvements in the JOMS's impact factor. He was capably assisted by Heather Julius and John Turner, who helped ensure the editorial quality of published papers. I am humbled by the prospect of trying to live up to the achievements of past editors. The JOMS is a precious resource to AAOMS members and to others seeking a reliable and authoritative source of critically and expertly reviewed information relating to the specialty of oral-maxillofacial surgery. Readers must be able to depend upon the JOMS when they seek to maintain the currency of their knowledge base, and be exposed to and able to understand the implications of cutting-edge research and ideas. In addition, those conducting OMS-related research need a resource that provides state-of-the-art information as a platform for their investigations. Investigators who have conducted studies, made unique clinical observations, or developed innovative concepts need the JOMS to vet submitted papers to ensure the information is timely, relevant, ethical, and safe, and also advance our knowledge and understanding of the health sciences. I pledge to do my best to strengthen the already strong JOMS and increase its value to AAOMS members and other stakeholders. I have chosen to use this issue's editorial to review changes to the JOMS that have been implemented. The initial change made for the Journal was recommended by the AAOMS leadership and wholeheartedly endorsed by myself; this change was the creation of the Associate Editor position and the selection of the first such individual, namely Thomas Dodson. Dr Dodson is a widely known and respected member of our specialty. He ably served on the editorial boards of the JOMS and my prior journal, Oral Surgery, Oral Medicine, Oral Pathology, Oral Radiology, and Endodontology (TripleO), for many years. He brings research methodology and clinical studies expertise to the editorial team and will serve as my right-hand person. Another change I implemented soon after my appointment was the development of an application process for service on the editorial board. For the American board, it allowed all AAOMS members to apply to serve as a section editor or on the general board. I believe this permits those with a sincere interest of serving the JOMS a way to identify themselves for consideration. We received a sizable number of applications from very talented individuals. The final selections were made by Dr Dodson and me, with approval by the AAOMS Board of Trustees. Also, in order to open up opportunities for others with an interest, I set staggered terms of 2-4 years for the initial group of general board members. When terms are completed, a call for applications will again go out, with all terms eventually being 4 years. The terms for all section editors are 4 years from the start. The JOMS is truly an international journal with respect to the authorship of papers and our readership. In recognition of this, an International Editorial Board was also created. In this case, the OMS society or association of countries from around the world was asked to nominate a member for the board. The board members were then selected and also approved by the Board of Trustees. These individuals will have 4-year terms. I hope that by review of the masthead page of this issue you will agree that we have an impressive editorial team in place. Looking at the masthead page will also reveal a change in the lineup of sections. The manner of division of the sections was done to try to reflect the major areas of clinical practice of oral-maxillofacial surgeons. This will hopefully facilitate the triaging of papers to the most appropriate peer-reviewers. I also hope it will allow readers to more readily find papers of particular interest to them. Section editors have been given greater authority over their section. The section editor will decide which papers are worthy of sending for peer-review and will select the peer-reviewers. Once peer-reviews are complete, the section editor will either recommend a paper be accepted or rejected, or send the article back to the authors for revision. All final acceptance and rejection decisions will be made by Tom Dodson and me. Many articles, particularly case reports, are often only of use by a relatively small number of individuals. When they appear in the print edition of the JOMS, they consume pages that both make the Journal unreasonably long and delay the appearance of papers of use to more readers. In order to improve this situation the Journal now reserves the right to decide if an accepted article will only appear in the online edition of the JOMS. This will speed both the publication of these articles, as well as those that will appear in the hard copy edition. Articles that only appear online will still appear in the table of contents, are fully indexed and citable, and will appear in PubMed and other search engines. The use of the online only process will allow us to eventually decrease the length of the print edition of JOMS and fill it with more generally useful and significant articles. In the past, virtually all JOMS editorials were written by the editor-in-chief. Editorials are by nature opinion pieces. I believe that a larger variety of opinions will be of benefit to our readers, so I will be asking Tom Dodson and others to author some editorials. A more cosmetic change occurred with this issue, that being a modification in our cover art. I have always enjoyed journals that list articles on their covers. It certainly can serve as a “teaser” of what is inside. But more importantly, I feel it helps inform readers of our Journal who are not members of the AAOMS of the scope of our practice in America. We hope to achieve other improvements to the JOMS. These include greatly shortening the submission to decision time for authors, and the acceptance to publication time for authors and readers. This is particularly important to keep the JOMS as timely and relevant as possible for readers. We hope to get more individuals to submit well produced videos of actions being described in their paper. This will be particularly useful for new ideas on procedures or illustrating with findings that do not reveal themselves well in photographs, such as motor nerve or muscle function after reconstruction. I also want greater focus on the size of illustrations in the Journal's print edition. We hope to “right size” them to allow readers to clearly see important details being discussed in the article. We also urge residents in American and other residency programs to submit papers to our journal. The creation of an article for publication is a valuable learning exercise and makes the author a better consumer of articles written by others. There are a few things that fortunately will not be changing. Our publisher, Andrew Berin with Elsevier, will not change. In addition, Gwyn Driskill will remain the Journal Manager. Jan Teplitz and Janie Durham from the AAOMS will continue their dedicated staffing for the Journal. Patti Trujillo has been recruited to be our Editorial Assistant in Greenville. Patti and Gwyn are doing excellent work. Last, but certainly not least, Carmen Hupp is the new Managing Editor of the JOMS. She comes with 7 years of experience in the same role for TripleO. The Journal and I are truly lucky to have her in this critical position. Finally, I urge our AAOMS members and all others to feel free to send me your thoughts, concerns, and ideas. ⁎Note that if you want to share your thoughts with the readership, letters to the editor must be submitted on our Web site at http://ees.elsevier.com/joms.Note that if you want to share your thoughts with the readership, letters to the editor must be submitted on our Web site at http://ees.elsevier.com/joms. I want the JOMS to remain the best source of OMS information for readers and a trusted collaborator for authors seeking to publish their findings and understandings.