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Indian Pediatr 2012;49: 609 |
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Impact Factor 2011 and Random Musings
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Piyush Gupta and Devendra Mishra
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This communication comes to
you at an important juncture in the journey of Indian Pediatrics;
we are on the verge of starting the 50th
year of our publication (1964-2013). And truly, it has been a golden
journey as the journal has established itself as the topmost
Pediatrics journal of South East Asia and the most widely cited
specialty journal of India. The recently released Impact Factor 2011
by Thomson Scientific has brought happy tidings; Indian Pediatrics
has now entered the big league with its Impact Factor crossing 1 for
the first time. The 40% percent increase (0.75 in 2008, to 1.04 in
2011) within a time span of 4 years is phenomenal, made possible
only with the support, blessings, and patronage of 20,000 members of
Indian Academy of Pediatrics across the length and breadth of
country. The estimated readership of print version is almost
1,00,000 per month and the website hits cross the magic figure of 1
million every month. Alexa.com continues to rank our website as the
top pediatric journal website.
The impact of Indian Pediatrics on policy
and practice in Indian context is evident from its author and
reviewer database hailing from more than 40 countries, covering
almost all continents on earth (except Antarctica)! The
collaboration with Springer has heaped rich dividends both in terms
of services to authors and reviewers, increasing the visibility of
Indian Pediatrics on International front, and also reaping
financial benefits for the journal. The growing popularity of
Indian Pediatrics has led to the number of original submissions
rising by 40% from 750 in 2008, to almost 1100 in 2011. Submissions
from India accounted for 67% of the submissions and 74% of the
accepted articles. In the year 2011, Indian Pediatrics has gone
totally online with 100% of the manuscripts being received, peer
reviewed and processed through the online manuscript management
system. The online manuscript management system has enabled faster
review time and transparency of workflow, such as the ability to
keep track of the manuscript. In the year 2011, average turnaround
time for decision (number of days between the date the manuscript
was received and the first decision) was only 10.2 days.
Another recent change made is the web-publication
of articles, immediately on acceptance, thus providing an early
access to readers and researchers. With the continuing support from
editorial board members and reviewers, we have been able to further
reduce the publication time of accepted research articles to
approximately five months. We had a huge backlog of Case-reports
with us, which has now come down significantly, and these are being
published within 6 months of acceptance. In order to maintain
highest standards of publication ethics besides quality publication,
Indian Pediatrics is now regularly screening the manuscripts
for any plagiarized material, electronically.
The Book Editors Choice: The Best of Indian
Pediatrics for the Practitioners (A compendium of topical
reviews, guidelines and recommendations formulated by the Indian
Academy of Pediatrics (IAP), its Chapters, Groups, and Committees;
and other National bodies) was released in 2010. The total print
order was sold out and very well received. In 2011, we also released
the much awaited third edition of Textbook on Pediatrics and
Neonatal Emergencies.
One of the major initiatives of the present
editorial board was to have a firm plan for capacity-building of
young Indian researchers to publish their research work. The
workshops on Art and Science of Writing a Paper have been
gaining ever-increasing popularity. By the time you read this, we
would have already completed our 8 th
workshop in Delhi, having previously conducted it at Bangalore,
Kottayam, Pune, and Varanasi; besides the Capital of India. The
success of these workshops will only be gauged through increasing
publication success of young pediatricians and also, hopefully, by
increased submission of high-quality manuscripts to us and other
journals.
Be on the lookout for our 50 th
anniversary Golden Jubilee Commemorative Issue in January 2013.
This bumper issue with a new cover is definitely going to be a
collectors’ item. With editorials from past Editor-in-Chiefs,
snippets from past issues, and seminal articles on pediatrics
problems in the last 50 years in India, readers are definitely in
for a treat. In the Golden Jubilee year, another endeavor of the
editorial team will be to put up the Table of Contents of all
volumes of Indian Pediatrics online, right from 1964! Links will be
provided to their abstracts already available on PubMed.
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