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Revista Colombiana de Cardiología

Print version ISSN 0120-5633

Rev. Colomb. Cardiol. vol.21 no.1 Bogota Jan./Feb. 2014

 

A new stage

Una nueva etapa

Jorge León-Galindo, MD., FACC.

Editor, Revista Colombiana de Cardiología

Correspondencia: Dr. Jorge León-Galindo, correo electrónico: revista@scc.org.co

Recibido: 03/03/2014. Aceptado: 03/03/2014.


The Revista Colombiana de Cardiologia (RCC) has come a long way in the history of our cardiology since November 1985 when we saw its birth, almost of course, without suspecting her pregnancy. It was developed as a spontaneous mutation in medical practice and in our nascent research. It appeared as a newborn crying to be fed with the science that the country produced then. It was born to organize and to leave printed the scientific history of our cardiology and gradually contribute to the formation of our researchers in this field. It was growing and developing under the trust and credibility of the members of the Colombian Society of Cardiology and Cardiovascular Surgery and other doctors who patronized it by sending hundreds of valuable articles on various topics in cardiology that nurtured it up to the current state. The RCC acquired in his way a great recognition in the nation and in Latin America. In his tour by the scientific- literary way it encountered many problems and difficulties, always solved with the help of the different Boards of Directors of the Society. But this embryo of publication born in that November, always had in his mind a fixed and even obsessive target: take our cardiology, clinical experience and our knowledge to the global science, publicizing our research and our authors. The editor felt great responsibility since the beginning of the Journal to respond to the confidence of the authors who send their thoughts and clinical experiences for publication, and felt always uncomfortable at circumscribing this knowledge to our borders and our Spanish language. Although from the first issue of the journal the summary of the articles was translated into English, his dream was and is, that the entire contents may come out on the freeway of knowledge in two languages, Spanish and English, to all corners of the world, so that Colombian cardiology can take the position that corresponds to its quality, reliability and evidence. Being able to expose its content to the world in a network with international recognition in these languages, doctors around the world will be able to read it and exchange ideas, share results, and thus bring to our homeland the knowledge and science of the world's leading researchers. From a little less than fifteen years the RCC entered the Latin American indexes such as SciELO (Scientific Library on Line), and Lilacs (Latin American Literature in Health Sciences), and from 2000 to Publindex, the rate of scientific publications of the country, developed by COLCIENCIAS, where it is located into the category A2. While our publication has no access to international indexes, our circulation will be limited to Iberian and LatinAmerican field. Being the RCC affiliated to the world's largest publisher that has one of the most extensive and sophisticated computer systems in the world, it will bring valuable scientific fruits to the country. With this connection, scientific exchange opens, ideas flourish and the results will be seen soon. Breakthroughs and communications facilities are the biggest revolution in humanity in this century and the millennium; distances shorten and borders open in the world of knowledge.

For these reasons, about four years ago a contact with Elsevier was made, as we saw that through it the RCC could take off for distant skies. That dream has come true. At this point, I want on behalf of the Co-Editor and Editorial Committee, thank the current Board and especially its President Dr. Efrain Gomez for believing in RCC, providing support and feeling confidence in the project . They have shared with us this dream. Great responsibility and a great challenge share the Editor, the Co-Editor and the Editorial Committee to achieve takeoff in the new stage of our publication. Through feasibility studies, I believe that we will overcome the challenge of making our project feasible.

I want to make some notes on Elsevier, because their services are extensive and could benefit us in several areas. This editorial organization has a long life; was founded in 1880 in Amsterdam where it has its principal office. Is a multinational company and is the leading publisher of scientific information, technics in information products and medical services. Elsevier delivers information to more than 30 million scientists, students and health professionals worldwide. It is associated with 7,000 journal editors, 70,000 members of editorial boards, with 300,000 referees and 600,000 authors, all to help his readers and customers to advance in the knowledge of science and the health care providing information (world class information). It has more than 7,000 employees in 24 countries. In developing countries has contributed with resources for publications to provide free or low cost access to science and technology in the field of health to professionals and institutions in these countries.

Elsevier's strength lies in the publication of scientific journals and in the books in which they have sponsored the arbitration process for over 130 years.

Elsevier offers services such as Science Direct giving access to full text articles referred through SciVerse in over 2,500 journals and chapters of about 20,000 books. Scopus is the world's largest medical index in terms of peer-reviewed abstracts of articles and citations of medical literature; it is an important tool for searching, analyzing and visualizing the research. It has services to which the professional can enroll at a cost, such as QUOSA, which manages the available literature on health sciences. ClinicalKey is a newly created search engine through which the doctor can inform and update most of the world's publications, from top magazines indexed and the best books published. Reaxys ' provides answers to clinical decisions in everything related to research in the field of chemistry and reveals the present of the recent discoveries of drugs in the different medical fields. MD Consult, answers questions , recommend books and magazines and performs article reviews. It has a section for patient education and a section that gives information on medicines and guides of clinical management, and offers pictures and the latest news on the Pathway Studio. It helps to understand the disease, its mechanism, predicts prognosis and gives information about the drug interaction. The SciVal establishes, implements and evaluates the strategies of research, and also provides additional services.

Elsevier's mission is to deliver information to the world (world class information). As discussed earlier, is the global leader in medical information and health, provides technology and provides solutions to improve the quality of health along with a philosophy of cost reduction. Through the Clinical Decision Support (CDS , Clinical Decision Support ), Elsevier contributes with guidance on various topics in health, giving information on data and providing solutions to service providers, the pharmaceutical industry and the users of these services. With the world class information and solutions through point- of-care technology, optimizes decisions to improve the quality, the safety and the results of the cost-effectiveness in health care.

The CDS alerts on potential complications that may occur and that are reported by providers. This tool helps doctors find the help they need, either in their medical practice in a learning process of a medical procedure, if they are reviewing the latest evidence or are looking for support for a treatment plan. The CDS is increasingly used by hospitals, by physicians in their practice, pharmacies, government agencies or insurance.

Technology and research are constantly impacting medical practice. The challenge is to maintain access to most of the information giving support to health care based on evidence, and providing the tools to standardize teaching in clinical practice and the development of practical skills (practical skills).

This company works in partnership with globally recognized companies in science and health, publishing more than 2,000 journals, including Lancet and Cell, and close to 20,000 book titles, in partnership with companies such as Mosby and Saunders. Elsevier, with online solutions , has SciVerse ScienceDirect , SciVerse Scopus, Reaxys, MD Consult and Nursing Consult, SciVal suite and MEDai 's Pinpoint Review, which help researchers and institutions working in health care. With these tools, physicians and hospitals have improved their practice and their results, and even cost-effectiveness ratio.

Scientific publication

The transmission of knowledge is attempted through scientific journals, which means we want to spread it not only in the immediate environment but to globalize it so that all cultures find out what we're working and what we are developing. But the concept extends not only to the dissemination of our knowledge but also that it be understood and applied in other environments, and may become a cornerstone for the development of new technologies.

Scientific publications have become the manager of the knowledge of science. The great knowledge revolution occurred in the 80s of the last century, when the National Science Foundation of the United States delivered resources along with resources from the private sector to create the backbone of a virtual system called "Internet", which initially devoted to academia. Then in the 90s, this net system was extended to the whole world and the marketing began, ensuring its sustainability and success. With the introduction in the world of this democratic system, every inhabitant of this planet Earth has the right and ability to enter and connect virtually with any person or institution that is connected to the system. Since then the system became fundamental to human life. In June 2012 more than a third of the world population (over 2,400 million people) used the Internet service. This system increased communications abruptly in a never expected exponential way. Its use in voice communication and video facilitated and cheapened communications in education and in the commercial field. It changed the habits of most people in the world. This became the biggest technological revolution, never expected for humanity. But this change or revolution, touched and changed in a radical form the transmission of knowledge, saving immeasurable time in spreading the knowledge of science, its exchange and early use of the results of scientific work. Tertiary communication roads through physical media such as letters, decreased dramatically and the system is almost completely replaced by virtual high -speed highways that allow real-time communication regardless of distance or geographical and physical difficulties in any area where the person may be. That is, access to knowledge is immediate.

Impact and visibility of scientific articles

After the start of the RCC from the 90s, digitization of the content of the publication began. Through the magazine scanning, access via Internet to the contents of the publication was guaranteed, which meant its "socialization" facilitating its dissemination. This visibility motivates authors to publish on it because being in the network the dissemination of knowledge of their scientific work is increased. Then the question arises of how to determine and measure this diffusion and visibility. The answer is that it can be measured in several ways , as with the circulation of the magazine, or its presence in catalogs and libraries, directories of periodical publications, its presence in databases or in access services to full articles as by Elsevier Science Direct. This presence can guarantee the quality. The more internationally referred pointer to measure the visibility of a publication is the "impact factor" created by the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI ) of the United States, which reports it every two years. The impact factor measures the resonance that a particular journal has had in the scientific literature from the analysis of the citations that have received the items that have been published on it. It allows comparison between journals, provides ranking functions and reflects the relative relevance of each publication. If we add another dream of the RCC Editor, besides that of having the impact factor of our publication, is that it be accepted in the National Library of Medicine in Washington and be included in Medline. By linking with Elsevier, these dreams become closer.

The impact factor is calculated as follows:

A = the number of times articles published in journal X in the period of the previous two years (ie 2011-2012) have been cited in publications that are in the ISI, which are given a followup over the next year (e.g. 2013).

B = the number of articles published in the journal X during this two-year period (ie 2011-2012).

C = the impact factor of the journal X in two years.

C = A / B.

Every two years in the Journal Citation Report (JCR) the ISI publishes the impact factor of the journals; it is the proxy indicator of the scientific quality of the journal. However, the ISI notes that the number of citations (quantitative factor) of an article should not replace the qualitative assessment made by "peer review" or expert opinion. The impact factor as an indicator of visibility is widely accepted today; however, it should be noted that this factor has significant variations depending on the discipline, its growth rate, the size of the scientific community, publishing habits, etc.

There are pros and cons of the impact factor (1). Among the pros we find that there is an international coverage with over 8,400 publications in 60 countries, that the results are published and are available for free and that the impact factor is easy to use and understand. Among the cons is the fact that the number of citations does not really measure the quality but the quantity of publications, that the base calculation period of two years to obtain the citations is very short, and that there are important articles that are frequently cited even after decades.

Although the method of measuring the impact factor of a journal is not perfect, it does help in the evaluation of a publication and is the current way to assess it internationally. In a couple of years the RCC will have an impact factor by increasing its visibility, and the challenge for the editorial board will be great for improving it over time. The number of journals published in language other than English is very scarce in the Journal Citation report ; that is why we must make a major effort to translate the magazine into that language, in order to be cited, which means that it be read.

The effort made by the review has been immense over the years. This is to fulfill its fundamental mission: to help.

Bibliografía

1. Bruynooghe M. Theory and practice of logic programming and the ISI web of knowlwedge. Association for Logic Programming Newsletter, November 2005.         [ Links ]