This year we have the honor of producing the 30th volume of the Scandinavian Journal of Primary Health Care. In 1983, the first issue of the Journal was published with the late professor of general practice at Copenhagen University, Paul Backer, as the Editor-in-Chief. He and his distinguished Nordic colleagues had experienced a huge increase in the academic activities relating to general practice. In the years prior to the first issue of the Journal, the first Nordic congresses of general practice had been held in Copenhagen and Bergen. Although small and with only a few academic GPs attending, these congresses formed the starting point for the Journal. With the help from the newly started national colleges of general practice and the university departments, a group of Nordic pioneers succeeded in initiating a scientific journal on family medicine.
The Journal had some fundamental purposes. First, it was very important that the Nordic countries had the opportunity to work more closely together on the academic family medicine. General practice in the Nordic countries, although different in organization and structure, played a huge role in the national health care systems. Therefore, the academic family medicine needed a platform for developing research methodology, pre-graduate university-based education, and special training for general practice.
Second, the growing number of researchers in the Nordic countries needed a journal to show the international community that the Nordic academic family medicine was able to support and drive the international development of family medicine.
Third, there was a growing understanding for a much broader look at family medicine. Traditionally, research and education had been led by doctors. However, in these years the importance of other scientific disciplines and research methodology to develop the fundamentals of family medicine was highly acknowledged.
Today, 30 volumes later, we must conclude that this group of pioneers, together with a number of subsequent editors and support from the national colleges have succeeded in reaching their goals. We now have a Nordic Federation of General Practice (NPGP) which runs, supports and develops an international journal together with the Nordic congresses. The research, together with knowledge-based teaching and education, are experiencing increased scientific foundation. The NFGP can be very proud of having one of the leading journals within this field, having provided the academic family medicine in the Nordic countries with a platform for publishing research, and making the special Nordic general practice part of the international development of health care systems.
Therefore, we are proud to say that the Scandinavian Journal of Primary Health Care contributes substantially to a general practice, where people have access to a well-educated GP, high quality primary care, and a broad and continuous development of human, clinical, and organizational core elements in family medicine.
