Dear colleagues,
Since we began this endeavour over six years ago things have certainly changed: we have evolved from our first years of producing a few journals a year to our present monthly production –not to mention our numerous supplements and special iPAD editions– and, as you all know well, we have received our first Impact Factor a more than respectable 3.28…and we have every right to be proud of our growth and evident reputation.
As obvious as it might sound, we should remember again that all of this did not come about by accident, but is rather the result of hard work, adaptability and a clear-sighted vision by all the various participants implicated in this endeavour and our hard won maturity. One aspect that marks the increasing maturity of EuroIntervention is the way we relate to others in our field. Like an individual that is achieving his or her prime, our journal has developed a reputation that allows us to give back to our collaborators as much as we have asked on these long years of development. One example of this is the way we work with the other journals within the field of cardiology and specifically within the family of the European Society of Cardiology. After years of feeling “left out”, first we were adopted, and now we are clearly an active part, of that very special European family led by our “elder brother”, the European Heart Journal (EHJ). And while we depended on our elder sibling for support in our early days, and while we still deeply value our collaboration with EHJ, we have now arrived at that moment of adulthood where we can participate as well, offering back some of what we received. From our association with the European Heart Journal we have received moral support, articles and notoriety which we can now return through the quality of our own work and growing reputation. We all stand to gain.
We have told part of the story before, but it remains as vibrant as ever. The European Heart Journal –our respected “elder sibling” was founded in 1980 and has an impressive Impact Factor of over 10. Since Thomas Luscher took over as Editor-in-Chief in 2009, we have built on our personal relationship to create what is a mutual benefit for both publications but, most importantly, for the authors who wish to get published. This relationship is formal in the sense that I act as one of the senior consulting editors of the EHJ. Our relationship allows the European Heart Journal to act as a conduit for the quick publication of certain articles in associated journals, such as ourselves, which are targeted at a more specialised audience. EHJ receives, reviews and publishes high quality articles of a more general cardiological nature. The European Heart Journal receives around 3,500 submissions a year, and has a strict review process which will only allow for 15% to be accepted for publication. Many of these rejected papers are excellent, but more appropriate, or of greater interest to a sub-speciality publication, thus a mechanism has been put in place to allow for the movement of these already peer reviewed articles to be transferred to EuroIntervention (as well as other sub-speciality journals in the ESC family, depending on the subject), allowing us choose to publish them within a minimum amount of time by taking into account the already strict peer review process of our “older brother” publication. In the last volume year of EuroIntervention (up to April 2012) this special relationship has resulted in the publication of 12 quality articles, and in the current volume (beginning May 2012) already eight papers have been published –clearly a benefit for both journals as well as for the authors and our perspective readership.
This is a relationship that is complementary without being a novelty. Circulation and JACC each have their subspecialty offspring and our relationship with EHJ allows us a similar foothold in what is, as you well know, a competitive world for the diffusion of scientific knowledge. Our ability to collaborate in a constructive fashion fits in, as well, with an overall movement on the part of the EAPCI and the European Society of Cardiology to work more and more closely with PCR and the PCR family of educational resources.
We began perhaps as an “outsider”; we were a bit of a waif, a journal not completely in the ESC fold, striking out on our own, but slowly, through the thoughtful and constructive collaboration with Thomas Luscher, the more than friendly almost familial relationship with European Heart Journal –our “elder brother”– has brought us in from the cold and allowed us to offer, in return, our very best.
