The South African Journal of Radiology goes
GO RAD!

The SAJR took a major step towards international recognition when Eric Stern, Editor of GO RAD, extended an invitation to the editorial board to join a 2-year-old consortium of 30 continental/multinational/national society journals. Eric Stern is a professor of radiology at the University of Washington, USA, and specialises in thoracic imaging. GO RAD (Global Outreach-Radiology  – www.isradiology.org/gorad) is a global outreach programme of the International Society of Radiology. Their aim is greater global exchange of radiological knowledge and a positive influence on healthcare, by providing a vehicle for worldwide dissemination of appropriate peer-reviewed published educational and scientific content for radiologists and related healthcare providers.

With articles chosen as those most appropriate to developing nations and medically underserved areas, GO RAD helps to increase the visi-bility and global outreach of co-operating journals and the authors of selected articles, as well as to bring together senior editors of the sponsoring organisations.

Partnering society journals agree to provide select open access immediately on publication to appropriate content (e.g. one article per issue). The mechanics are that GO RAD simply places hyperlinks from the selected GO RAD articles back to the respective home journal. Since the SAJR is a quarterly open-access journal, it is easy to link the content. An example from SAJR Vol. 15 No. 3 is:

Pseudomyxoma peritonei (PMP) - a rare entity

http://www.sajr.org.za/index.php/sajr/article/view/344

 

Eric Stern states the following in his invitation: ‘In summary, although your journal is open access, we warmly welcome you and your publisher to be active participants and stake-holders in GO RAD, helping us to create a more valuable and coordinated global outreach effort.’

 

Access the GO RAD newsletter and announcement of the latest issue at http://isradiology.org/gorad/news/2011/2011_7.html. Here you will find freely available links to timely and topical articles from many of the world's leading radiology journals. In the latest issue, there are many new open-access articles on a variety of interesting topics, e.g. ‘Incidence and significance of inconclusive results in ultrasound for appendicitis in children and teenagers’, ‘Normal mediastinal and hilar lymph nodes in children on multi-detector row chest computed tomography’, ‘Multidetector computed tomography of spinal trauma: A pictorial review’ and ‘Spectrum of medication-induced complications in the abdomen: Role of cross-sectional imaging’.

Help us to spread the word about this valuable international radiology educational resource – tell your colleagues and friends! Please send feedback to Professor Stern at: editor.gorad@gmail.com.

Dissertation development

It has come to the notice of the Editorial Board that publication of an MMed dissertation as an original article in the South African Journal of Radiology is accepted as an alternative and reciprocal document for the MMed degree by a number of academic institutions.

The Editorial Board welcomes this development and intends facilitating the process by expediting dissertation material for early publication. A number of issues remain unresolved, however, and I ask for assistance from registrars, heads of academic departments, the RSSA Executive, College office bearers and the Health & Medical Publishing Group publication team.

Manuscripts must be clearly marked and uploaded on the webpage as a university dissertation. All dissertations presently in the pipeline need to be identified to expedite publication. A review team consisting of South African academics needs to be constituted. Presently, the most difficult and time-consuming aspect of the publication process is finding a reasonably qualified person as a reviewer in the field of expertise.

Clearly, dissertations constitute a different exercise, to be evaluated at a different academic level. If we intend using the journal as a vehicle for publication of university research material, then the process of validation and peer review has to be transparent and beyond reproach.

Suggestions, opinions and constructive criticism are needed. This is part of an evolutionary process towards a single-exit examination in radiology. At the same time, there is a natural stimulus for research and a constant flow of quality original research material to our journal. We need to plan correctly to ensure academic and ethical excellence at all times.

Jan Lotz

Editor-In-Chief