Indian Journal of Dermatology, Venereology and Leprology Medknow Publications on behalf of The Indian Association of Dermatologists, Venereologists and Leprologists (IADVL) ISSN: 0378-6323 EISSN: 0973-3922 Vol. 71, Num. 3, 2005, pp. 219-220

Indian Journal of Dermatology, Venereology and Leprology, Vol. 71, No. 3, May-June, 2005, pp. 219-220

Editor's Report

IJDVL: Looking back at the year 2004-2005

Khopkar Uday

IJDVL, Department of Dermatology, 117, 1st Floor, Old OPD Building, K.E.M. Hospital, Parel, Mumbai - 400012

Correspondence Address: IJDVL, Department of Dermatology, 117, 1st Floor, Old OPD Building, K.E.M. Hospital, Parel, Mumbai - 400012, editor@ijdvl.com

Code Number: dv05077

Dear Colleagues,

The year 2004 has been a busy one for us as we successfully covered a backlog in publication. During the year we published 8 issues and are now up to date with the publication calendar. Of course, this was made possible only by a steady stream of good articles from all of you.

As a result of our efforts to increase the international exposure of our journal, the IJDVL has now been indexed with more indexing agencies like EMBASE (excerpta medica), SCOPUS and Index Copernicus. The website of IJDVL (www.ijdvl.com) is now made available in 8 international languages in addition to English. All this has increased the exposure received to articles in IJDVL. Within a year it has received over 300,000 hits. The website provides full text access to all articles from 2000 onwards as well as abstracts from 1961. In the year ahead, we plan to make available online all full text articles published in the IJDVL between 1991 and 2000.

The manuscript submission site has now been completely revamped with the addition of several new and unique features. One of the new features that should be a boon to all authors is the capability of online checking of one′s own references for correctness of author names, journal abbreviation, volume no., page no. etc. However, the facility can check only journals listed in the PubMed. Other new features include facility for online uploading of copyright form, simplifying the revision submission process, and facility for checking PubMed for recent references.

During this hectic year, we tried to maintain the quality of publication of IJDVL and in some ways improve it. Thus, we are now getting all articles professionally copy edited. In accordance with the increasing importance of ethics and statistics in research we are paying more attention to ethical clearances for articles published and now have a statistical editor in Mr. Kailas Gandewar. On the first page of every article we now have information on how to cite the article, dates of submission and acceptance, sources of support and conflict of interest declaration. We also made our table of contents more interesting by printing it in color.

It is heartening to note that an increasing proportion of articles are being submitted in electronic format. As against only 50 odd articles submitted online last year 255 of the 349 articles were submitted online by authors. In addition, about 100 articles were submitted in electronic format and less than 25 as hard copies alone. This has speeded up our reviewing process and resulted in shorter publication times for many articles. The total time taken for the first decision on article during the year 2004 was 43 days which is close to what we aimed at. This compared favorably with the average review time of 7 months for article submitted during 2003. The average time from submission to acceptance was 76 days [Table - 1].

Of the 349 articles received, 161 (46%) were accepted (97 already published while 64 are waiting to be published), 113 were found unsuitable for publication while the rest are in various stages of evaluation or revision. The acceptance rate was highest for letters to editor section (83%) whereas it was lowest for the case report section (60%). Of the total decisions taken during the year 59% were "accepted" as compared to those taken last year where only 48% were "accepted". This indicates a steady improvement in the quality of articles being submitted to IJDVL and the credit for this goes to all the contributors.

While we have tried our best to do an impartial, blinded and transparent evaluation of the articles, it is possible that a few of the 113 rejected articles were actually deserving publication. In order to protect authors against such a possibility, we have decided to have Dr. A. K. Bajaj as an ombudsman for IJDVL. He will take care of any complaints about rejection, delays in publication or any other form of editorial misconduct. I thank all the reviewers and members of the editorial board who have worked hard to improve the quality of articles.

I congratulate Drs. Narsimha Rao P and TSS Lakshmi who have been chosen for the Bishnupriya Debi Award for the best article published in 2003 for their article, "Modifications of pulse therapy in pemphigus". I also congratulate Drs. S. Rao, S. D. Shenoy, S. Davis and S. Nayak for being chosen for the Indubala Memorial Award for the year 2004 for the best paper on the subject of contact dermatitis viz. Detection of formaldehyde in textiles by chromotropic acid method and Drs. VK Somani, F. Razvi, VNVL Sita for their paper on "Pigmentary demarcation lines" being chosen for Bishnupriya Debi Award for the best paper published in IJDVL in 2004.

I would like to place on record our appreciation for the co-operation by Medknow Publications who have designed and maintained our websites and have helped in the publication, printing and bibliographic indexing of the journal. I also thank M/s Procter & Gamble for their generous financial support for our websites. The cost of printing has gone up substantially during this year due to an increase in the number of pages being printed and the increasing the number of copies to be printed (due to burgeoning member strength of IADVL). In spite of this it has been possible to maintain the quality of printing only due to the generous support by pharmaceutical companies. I thank them with all sincerity and hope that they will continue to support us in our endeavor to improve the journal.

Copyright 2005 - Indian Journal of Dermatology, Venereology and Leprology

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