Getting Published & Peer Review

April 24, 2016 by

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Journal editors (L to R): Chris Hughes (CJSM), Eugene Hong (BJSM), Irfan Asif (Sports Health)

This weekend I’ve been catching up after the week I spent catching up after the recent American Medical Society for Sports Medicine (AMSSM) conference in Dallas saw me catching up with colleagues from around the globe.

‘Catching up’ after ‘catching up’ after ‘catching up’–does that sound like your life too?

Well, at last I have the time to compose some thoughts I have been meaning to share since I returned from Dallas, and they are focused on the session at AMSSM our journal held conjointly with BJSM and Sports Health: “Faculty Development: Getting Published in Sports Medicine Journals.”

For the attendees of the live event, I think it was a very useful panel discussion among the editors from three of the premiere journals in our profession.  Our instructions for authors are available on-line, but it was a rare opportunity for anyone contemplating sending us a manuscript to hear our Editor in Chief Chris Hughes talk about the submission process.  He and his colleagues on the panel, Drs. Asif and Hong,  gave insightful advice on how to choose which journals one might want to approach with a completed manuscript. The nuances of uploading a work and associated content to editorial manager were also discussed; and there were several questions and answers about the transit of a work through the peer review phase of things.  All in all, from the comments I heard during and after the event, the session was well received.

For many of you who couldn’t be there live, I’m happy to say that CJSM’s parent company, Wolters-Kluwer, is offering a couple of resources Read more of this post

Filed under General Interest

Hello Dallas!

April 17, 2016 by 1 Comment

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Current president of the South African Sports Medicine Association (SASMA) Phathokuhle Zondi (L) & AMSSM member Alison Brooks enjoying Dallas

I’m in Dallas for the annual American Medical Society for Sports Medicine (AMSSM) scientific conference, and I would typically be sharing a photo of the town in this post.  There is the small problem of a veritable tsunami of rain doing its best to keep me indoors.

I have no complaints.

AMSSM is celebrating its 25th year, and it has every reason to pat itself on the back.  The conference it’s putting on right now (hashtag: #AMSSM16) is so well put together that I am quite happy I do not have a pleasant, sunny day tempting me to head outdoors.  I’d much rather be inside catching all the proceedings.

Among the especially interesting aspects of the conference are the research and case study abstracts being presented both in poster-form and as podium lectures.  Our on-line version of the March 2016 issue has these abstracts available and there is some very interesting sports medicine information to be found there.  I am actually presenting a case on spinal muscular atrophy in a high school runner later this afternoon, and I’ve been listening to some other very interesting talks all through the day.

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The AMSSM “Wall of Honor,” giving a shout out to so many of the members who have contributed to the organization’s success

The keynote talks are emphasizing the all-important value of collegiality in our profession, and I couldn’t agree more. Read more of this post

Filed under General Interest Tagged with ,

The bane of an ultramarathoner’s existence: no more!

April 12, 2016 by 2 Comments

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Shoulda taped!!!! Picture courtesy Andry French, Wikimedia

One of the aspects of CJSM that I  love is our ‘published on line first’  function, whereby the articles which have gone through peer review and subsequent post-review author corrections are disseminated ‘on line’ before they can make it into the paper version of the journal.  It’s our version of ‘breaking news.’

The news that broke yesterday will be music to long-distance runners’ ears: say good-bye to blisters.

Yesterday, we published “Paper Tape Prevents Foot Blisters: A Randomized Prevention Trial Assessing Paper Tape  in Endurance Distances II (Pre-TAPED II)”.  The lead author is an emergency room physician from Stanford University, Grant Lipman.  Dr. Lipman has published other research on endurance running in our journal, most recently a well-received piece on “The Incidence and Prevalence of Acute Kidney Injury During Multistage Ultramarathons,” which was also published ‘on-line first.’

I must confess, the news of the Pre-TAPED trial was picked up so quickly by media outlets that I first heard about it on National Public Radio (NPR).  As an editor of CJSM, I normally have the ‘inside scoop,’ but this study generated so much immediate interest that NPR and others scooped me, including media outlets in the UK such as The Times of London.  These folks are already singing the praises of the ‘unlikely hero’ of this story:  inexpensive, surgical paper tape which can be found over the counter at any pharmacy and roughly costs a dollar a roll.  Cheap…..and effective.

Lipman and his study team recruited 128 runners participating in the 2014 250-km (155-mile) 6-stage RacingThePlanet ultramarathons in Jordan, Gobi, Madagascar, and Atacama Deserts.  The team devised a clever approach to testing their hypothesis that the paper tape would prevent blisters: Read more of this post

Filed under Injury Prevention Tagged with , ,