With the January 2011 issue, the AJO-DO enters its 96th year, I become the seventh editor-in-chief, and Dave Turpin concludes his highly successful career as journal editor. First of all, I realize that I have very big shoes to fill. Second, I can assure AAO members and subscribers that I will do my best to uphold the standard of excellence established by the previous editors. Third, you can be assured that I will not make major changes in the AJO-DO . Why should I? It is a well-respected journal. But with that said, I will be making some minor alterations. Let me explain.
As you stroll through the pages of this month’s issue, you will quickly observe some differences. By now, you must have noticed the addition of color to the journal pages. The AJO-DO has been a monochromatic journal (with respect to the text pages) for 95 years. When I was preparing for my interview for the editor’s job, I looked at many other dental journals. Although nearly all have added some color to their text pages, in my opinion, some of these journals have become too colorful. So, I have added a small amount of color to the title and text pages that ties in with the colors that are found on the cover. I hope you do not find these colors too shocking and will agree that the change is subtle.
The next addition that you will find is the section, Ethics in Orthodontics. Last year, the Council on Membership and Ethics of the AAO asked me to consider adding a column on ethics. I liked the idea. But I needed a good writer, who could regularly and reliably produce this section. After considering several possible names, I chose Peter Greco to become the Associate Editor of Ethics in Orthodontics. He agreed and has already produced some wonderful pieces that I believe you will find interesting and informative. This feature will appear monthly.
The next new section of the AJO-DO is titled Residents’ Journal Review. What is this? I have been an educator for my entire professional career. I recognize the educational resources that reside in the graduate orthodontic programs in the United States and Canada. My idea was to feature the senior orthodontic residents by having them provide current monthly research abstracts of interesting articles from other dental journals. When I approached the department chairs with this idea, the response was overwhelmingly positive. So, each month, a different orthodontic program will be featured. Since nearly all programs agreed to participate, the sequence of appearance in the AJO-DO will be in random order. Our readers will benefit by reading information from many peer-reviewed journal articles that they perhaps would not have seen.
The next new feature that will certainly draw attention is the section titled Point-Counterpoint. As your editor, I have limited ability to provide topical structure to each monthly issue. Let’s face it: the AJO-DO is a highly regarded peer-reviewed journal that publishes the results of carefully planned and choreographed research projects. As such, I will typically place the articles in the journal in the sequence that the reviewers gave their final approval. But, as orthodontists, we know that there are some controversial topics that could benefit from a timely, well-referenced discussion or debate, looking at both sides of the topic. This is the purpose of Point-Counterpoint. This section will be a quarterly feature. The first topic is the relationship between occlusion and TMD. This should be interesting!
Finally, you will notice that the number of Online Only articles published each month has increased from 5 or 6 per issue to 10. Why? One of my goals as your editor is to substantially reduce the time it takes for authors to get their research published in the AJO-DO . So I am emphatically encouraging authors to select the Online Only format. The reader can access the unabridged article sooner from the AJO-DO Web site, and the abstract is printed earlier in the journal. My goal is to reduce the time from acceptance to publication to about 6 months.
So, I hope you enjoy the new features that have been added to your AJO-DO . Let me know your opinions. Happy reading!
