The Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology – a new era

It was a great honour to be given the opportunity of taking on the position of Editor-In-Chief for the Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology (JOG) at the start of this year. I would like to acknowledge the huge contribution made to the journal by the late Professor Denis Hawkins, the founding editor, as well as my predecessors Editors-In-Chief; Professor Allan MacLean and Professor Ian Symonds. I would also like to acknowledge the contribution of the members of the Editorial Board over the years. This is evident in so many ways, but perhaps most clearly so in the significant rise in the Journal’s impact factor, which increased from 0.431 to 0.604 between 2009 and 2013, then further increased to 1.226 in 2021 during Professor Symonds’ term. Furthermore, the journal is now in the third quartile for index linked journals in the field of obstetrics and gynaecology based on CiteScore.

JOG is truly international in scope with contributions from 50 countries in 2013 increasing to 83 across the globe in 2021. In particular, we have seen an increase in submissions from Asia and low to middle income countries. The average annual downloads/views of our authors work is 152,000 from 80 countries of which the largest group of views was from North America. The journal received more than 1100 submissions of all types in 2021 which is nearly double the 600 figure received in 2013. This high demand has meant we have been able to pick only the best 27% of submission for publication. The quality and effort of our peer reviewers, as evidenced by the high (8.3/10) overall author satisfaction, is exceptional. We are incredibly grateful to our expert reviewers who give their time unpaid and often unacknowledged to review their peers’ work.

In an era of increasing subspecialisation, JOG is truly generalist in nature with a broad range of articles relevant to clinical practice covering the entire field of obstetrics and gynaecology from the bench-top to the bedside. The journal continues to attract a world-wide readership given the journal emphasis on practical applicability and its excellent record of drawing on an international base of authors.

JOG is also committed to the mentorship of ‘early career researchers’, including both junior doctors and established clinicians submitting their first publication. Past and present editors have recognised the difficulties that junior researchers encounter in achieving their first publications and spend time advising authors during their initial attempts at submission.

It is an exciting opportunity that JOG converted to open access journal from its 2023 volume. In the recent times, there has been an increasing trend to purely online publications and open access with many high impact journals in the field of Obstetrics and Gynaecology adopting this model. For JOG, the move to open access will significantly reduce the time from acceptance to being published in a volume online, and it will also greatly expand access to researchers’ work as readers will no longer need to have a subscription to the Journal (or affiliation with an organisation that does) to see the full paper. This is consistent with the journal’s vision to promote the dissemination of clinical knowledge and best practice as well as promoting the work of new researchers to a wider audience.

In his letter in 1675 to Robert Hooke, English physicist who discovered the law of elasticity, Isaac Newton made his most famous statement: ‘If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants’. I will continue building on the remarkable achievements of my predecessors. The initiative to develop special editions based around a number of topics reflecting the pattern of current submissions will be taken forward. These will be overseen by guest editors who will work with the Editor-in-Chief to reach out to acknowledged experts in these fields to invite them to submit papers. The future editorial vision of JOG is to have less focus on local retrospective observational studies, narrative reviews and case reports unless they are exceptionally of high quality, relevant to the international readership, and above all to the clinical practice and future patients. In addition, new types of articles are now considered by the journal; including ‘commentaries’ to attract contribution from renowned researchers and ‘operative techniques’ to facilitate publication of new surgical procedures or innovations in the established ones.

Given the challenge of increasing the number of submissions with all the additional workload that goes with it, Taylor and Francis, supported by the editorial board members, are actively looking to split the role into two Editors-in-Chief; one for gynaecology and one for obstetrics. This is, in my opinion, a step forward in the right direction given the rising sentiment around the western world calling for separation of obstetrics and gynaecology in training and clinical practice. The rapidly expanding field of surgical technology has deeply affected Gynaecology, a different and separate specialty from Obstetrics. The diseases, ailments, conditions, and disorders in a pregnant woman have nothing in common with gynaecologic malignancy, symptomatic myomas, or advanced endometriosis. There is hardly any senior researcher who conducts studies in both fields. It actually seems that no common ground between these two specialties other than patient sex (Pandey and Lindow 2006, Magrina 2014).

I am sure, by working together, JOG will raise its profile and continue its mission given the unique market brand name and relevance to its contributing authors, readership and patients.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.