BMC Editor’s Day 2013:

MALARIA JOURNAL Developing a successful journal: an

Editor’s perspective

Marcel HommelEditor-in Chief, Malaria Journal

In 2001, creation of the OPEN ACCESS concept

= creation of Malaria Journal, online and open access journal

• Peer-review and copy-editing (= quality)

• No cost for the reader, but cost for authors who pay an ‘APC’ (£1,310/US$2,110/€1,630 in 2012)

• From the beginning, no APC or a reduced APC for authors from the poorest countries (World Bank list)

• Copyright belongs to author not the journal

In 2001, in which journal were malaria papers published ?

25% of the 1,660 articles published were in

American Journal of Tropical Medicine and HygieneTransactions of the Royal Society of Tropical

MedicineTropical Medicine and International HealthAnnals Tropical Medicine and ParasitologyTrends in Parasitology (ex Parasitology Today)Infection and Immunity

Disease-specific journals are not a new concept: Tubercle created in 1919AIDS created in 1988J Viral Hepatitis in 1994

Why a journal on Malaria?

In 2012,

Malaria papers (4,166) – adjusted number: 3,68829% were published in

Malaria Journal (439)(12%)PLoS ONE (322)Am J Trop Med Hyg (92)Trop Med Int Health (90)Parasites & Vectors (66)Acta Tropica (66)

..a major shift towards Open Access journals

Careful : bibliometric tools are not very accurate tools !

For example : Web of Science - keyword ‘malaria’01 Jan 2012 to 01 Jan 2013 - Result : 4,166 papersActual (corrected results): 3,688 – 9 to 11 % not relevant

Errors detected:• some 2013 and 2011 papers• some records not papers but meetings abstracts• papers with no relevance or only trivial malaria content

- Wild cervids are host for tick vectors of Babesia species with zoonotic capability in Belgium. VECTOR-BORNE AND ZOONOTIC DISEASES Volume: 12 Issue: 4 Pages: 275-280

-Spinal bombesin-recognized neurones mediate more nonhistaminergic than histaminergic sensation of itch in mice. CLINICAL AND EXPERIMENTAL DERMATOLOGY Volume: 37 Issue: 3 Pages: 290-295

Number of malaria papers published(from Hommel M. Malar J 2010, 9:284)

In 2012, Malaria Journal published over 12% of papers on malaria, but is it a quality journal ?

What makes quality ?

• Editorial Board• Peer-review process• Quality output – copy-editing papers• Influence in the discipline• Metrics : Impact factor, Eigenfactor, etc• Quality publisher

A strong Editorial board, with about 50 top names in the field, involved in peer-reviewing. Final decision made by Editor-in-chief

Unique feature: 20% of Editorial board are changed every year (randomly !)

2008 2009 2010 2011 20120

100

200

300

400

500

600

700

800

Submissions Publications

Submissions and publications for the journal in the last 5 years

Average submissions per month in 2012 = 57.5Average publications per month in 2012 = 36.5

• 2011 Impact Factor - 3.19• Journal is ranked 2nd in Tropical Medicine (behind PLoS NTD) and 7th in Parasitology

Impact in the field

• Quality of anti-malarials collected in the private and informal sectors in Guyana and Suriname

•Implementation of basic quality control tests for malaria medicines in Amazon Basin countries: results for the 2005–2010 period

•Malaria resurgence: a systematic review and assessment of its causes (Press Released on World Malaria Day)

• Artemether resistance in vitro is linked to mutations in PfATP6 that also interact with mutations in PfMDR1 in travellers returning with

Plasmodium falciparum infections

• Estimates of child deaths prevented from malaria prevention scale-up in Africa 2001-2010• A new world malaria map: Plasmodium falciparum endemicity in 2010

• A framework for assessing the risk of resistance for anti-malarials in development

Malaria Journal publishes excellent high quality research, which is of interest to a wider audience. It is therefore, important to make sure that articles are disseminated to the general public as well as to the scientific community. In the past 12 months, Press Releases have been sent out for the following articles. Where possible, we have coordinated Press Releases with the authors’ institutes.

Press releases

WHO decides to publish its malaria policy recommendations in Malaria Journal

* These are based on accesses from the journal website and do not include accesses from repositories such as PubMed Central

Feb-02

Jun-02

Oct-02

Feb-03

Jun-03

Oct-03

Feb-04

Jun-04

Oct-04

Feb-05

Jun-05

Oct-05

Feb-06

Jun-06

Oct-06

Feb-07

Jun-07

Oct-07

Feb-08

Jun-08

Oct-08

Feb-09

Jun-09

Oct-09

Feb-10

Jun-10

Oct-10

Feb-11

Jun-11

Oct-11

Feb-12

Jun-12

Oct-12

Feb-13

0

50,000

100,000

150,000

200,000

250,000

300,000

350,000

400,000

Article accesses to Malaria Journal

The articles most read in 2011

Overall, for all BMC journals, the submission pattern is:

In 2011, Malaria Journal published 388 papers of which• 105 had African scientists as first author (27%)• 52 had African scientists as co-author (13%)• 14 concerned African issues, without African co-author

Based on 2010 published papers

MALARIACONFERENCES

The next one:Challenges in Malaria Research: Core Science and Innovationwill be held in Oxford, 22-24 September 2014(organizers: Simon Hay and Marcel Hommel) 9

Editorial issues

• Finding peer-reviewers

• Editing and production issues – mathematical formulae and tex

• Legal issues – libelous statements (how to spot them ?)

• Ethical issues – trial registration

• Authorship issues

• Managing quantity and speed of publication