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| EDITORIAL |
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| Year : 2015 | Volume
: 13
| Issue : 1 | Page : 1-2 |
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NJGP: Achieving visibility
Jide Onyekwelu
Editor-in-Chief, The Nigerian Journal of General Practice (NJGP), the Official publication of the Association of General and Private Medical Practitioners of Nigeria (AGPMPN), Nigeria
| Date of Web Publication | 12-Jun-2015 |
Correspondence Address:
Jide Onyekwelu
Obinwanne Hospital and Maternity, 19 Uba Street, Nkpor. P. O. Box 4570 Onitsha, Anambra State
Nigeria
 Source of Support: None, Conflict of Interest: None  | Check |
DOI: 10.4103/1118-4647.158705
How to cite this article:
Onyekwelu J. NJGP: Achieving visibility. Niger J Gen Pract 2015;13:1-2 |
I was appointed Editor-in-Chief of The Nigerian Journal of General Practice (NJGP) in November 2013. On February 5, 2014 I accepted the appointment and actually took over from the immediate past Editor-in-Chief on April 5, 2014. The journal has been in existence since 1985. The past editors did incredibly marvelous job. It is not easy to do what they did under the prevailing circumstances. Authors send hard copies and soft copies of their manuscripts via E-mail to the editor. He goes through, does technical modifications and sends back to the author for implementation. The author implements the modifications and sends back to the editor again either by post or E-mail. The editor receives it, calls his friends on phone informing them of articles to be sent to them for peer review. When they accept, he sends the article to them either by post or E-mail for peer review. I will stop so far in describing the daunting laborious process of the manuscript management system.
Past editors did all these and then published by print only method. The logistics of printing and distribution to readers all over the country can only be imagined than experienced. Unfortunately, I experienced it. The last edition of our journal (November 2014 issue) which happens to be my maiden edition was produced that way.
Who are our readers? They are members of our Association of General and Private Medical Practitioners of Nigeria (AGPMPN) and a few others that may be interested in the Association. These form our readership audience. A recent unpublished study done on the readership of the NJGP in Anambra State of Nigeria shows that less than 50% of members access the journal hard copy. Less than 50% of those that access it read it at all. The journal is not in electronic archival format where readership and citations can be tracked and captured. The immediate past Editor-in-Chief Dr. Francis Edo Olotu hoisted the journal on African Journals online AJOL but its access was restricted with a fee. After all the herculean task of manuscript management and print only production, very few people can access it. Its accessibility is also limited to Nigeria. What a wasted labour.
| Paradigm Shift | |  |
E-manuscript management system
When I took over in April 2014, I promised to institute a paradigm shift. Now we have a platform for manuscript management. Visit our website www.journalonweb.com/njgp/register as an author and upload your article. There is no need for posts or E-mails with their attendant delays. Once you have registered and uploaded your manuscript, you can keep track of its movement till it is published or rejected. It is simple, open and convenient.
This management system incorporates double-blind peer review system. This ensures publication of top quality articles. The author is subtly urged and developed to write better articles and the journal maintains top quality world's best standards.
Open access
Print-only publishing is now history. We have entered the era of Open access ( OA). OA has been on for more than 2 decades now. There are two main types of OA: gold and green. In gold OA, the published article is immediately and freely accessible to all readers at no cost at all. The reader has the liberty to download it and archive without any copyright restrictions. The green OA gives time restriction for about one year before the article can be freely open. Our journal is now Gold Open Access. In fact, this issue is the first gold Open Access publication of the NJGP.
The advantages are numerous. Let me mention a few.
- Accessibility is fast. Just a click of the button and the reader has access. There is no need to manually distribute loads of the journal from place to place
- Accessibility is worldwide. From anywhere in the world, any reader can access it. It is no more restricted to Nigerians in Nigeria
- It is free. The reader does not have to pay access fees
- The reader may not even need to know about the journal before accessing it. All he has to do is key in some keywords and do a search. If an article in our journal contains the keywords, he will be directed to it
- Citations of articles in the journal will be captured by scientific databases for calculation of impact factor.
Expected impact on the journal
- The expected wider visibility and accessibility will certainly improve patronage. More authors will be enthusiastic to publish in NJGP
- Articles in the journal will be more read and arguably more cited. This will improve the impact factor of the journal
- NJGP will be fulfilled as actually delivering on the aims that informed its formation. It will be able to actually disseminate scientific information to the world from Nigeria and also be a platform for non-Nigerians to disseminate scientific information.
Expected impact on the author
- Visibility of work. No author toils to write an original scientific paper and hides it. He wants it seen, read and cited. NJGP is the platform to do that
- This rigorous double-blind peer review system helps develop the writer to write or continue to write quality articles.
Expected impact on the reader
- The reader has easy availability of materials for his/her research, free of charge
- It encourages industry.
| Conclusion | | |
The Nigerian Journal of General Practice (NJGP) has indeed arrived. It has joined the league of international journals. I want to appreciate the authors that had sent us articles before now. You now have added reasons and incentives to send us more articles. Thanks for supporting us. Let us grow together. I also want to appreciate the immediate past Editor-in-Chief Dr. Francis Edo Olotu. He did great work on the journal and he has been around to assist me. I also appreciate the National Officers and National Executive Council of AGPMPN for accepting my proposal for this paradigm shift. It is a dream come true. Finally, I appreciate my editorial team: Dr. Sylva Ezievuo, Dr. F T Kalu, Academician Prince Dr. Philip Njemanze, Prof. Stanley Anyanwu (Editorial Adviser) and Dr. Francis Edo Olotu (Immediate past Editor-in-Chief). Be reminded that we are just taking off. Fasten your seatbelts. We have not yet reached cruising altitude but we will get there.
Happy reading.
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