Each week, I receive the message cited in the title from one or more of our authors whose manuscripts have been accepted and are scheduled for publication in The American Journal of Medicine. Reasoning behind these requests varies but often has to do with desires on the author’s part for priority in the medical literature, grant application timing, and a variety of other reasonable and pressing issues. Of course, if we move this manuscript ahead in the publication queue, another author’s publication date has to be delayed because we decide which material will be published in a specific issue a number of months in advance of the actual publication date. In an ideal world, we would publish manuscripts as soon as they had been accepted and copy edited by the team here in Tucson and in New York at Elsevier headquarters. However, the process leading to publication requires time spent in manuscript revision, copy editing, typesetting, proofreading, approval of the galley proofs by authors, and other more minor administrative issues related to the publication process. I actually have been very impressed with how quickly Elsevier and the printer who actually prints the Journal respond to our digitally transmitted publication materials.
In an effort to speed publication and to help our authors communicate with the medical scientific world as quickly as possible, we have instituted a process whereby manuscripts are posted on our journal website as soon as copy editing is finished, and the authors approve the galley proof.
To read this article in its entirety, please visit our website.
— Joseph S. Alpert, MD, Editor-in-Chief
This article originally appeared in the May 2010 issue of The American Journal of Medicine.
