The first five years of the Serbian journal of the medical chamber – a brief overview and analysis

This is a brief overview of the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber, marking its fifth anniversary. It aims to inform the reader about the Journal in the context of other Serbian medical publications and present a concise analysis of the types of articles published and the topics covered to date, thus providing insight into what the Journal offers to both readers and authors.

INTRODUCTION

The 2024 list of categorized Serbian scientific journals issued by the Ministry of Science, Technological Development, and Innovation of the Republic of Serbia shows a total of 44 journals issued by domestic publishers that fall under the medical sciences category. Of these, four journals – Acta Veterinaria, the Journal of Medical Biochemistry, the Serbian Archives of Medicine, and the Military Medical and Pharmaceutical Journal of Serbia – are indexed in the Web of Science (SCI-E, SSCI, AHCI) and the Journal Citation Reports (JCR) [1]. The remaining 40 are listed as domestic journals [1]. Most of the said journals publish articles in either English or Serbian (with titles and abstracts in both languages); some are published exclusively in the English language or exclusively in the Serbian language, while nine journals publish articles in both languages [1],[2],[3],[4],[5],[6],[7],[8],[9],[10],[11],[12],[13],[14],[15],[16],[17],[18],[19],[20],[21],[22],[23],[24],[25],[26],[27],[28],[29],[30],[31],[32],[33],[34],[35],[36],[37],[38],[39],[40],[41],[42],[43],[44],[45]. The oldest medical journal in Serbia is the Serbian Archives of Medicine, first published in 1872 [4].

While many domestic medical publications (e.g., the Serbian Journal of Public Health, published by the Institute of Public Health of Serbia Dr Milan Jovanović Batut) have an established tradition, having been in circulation for a number of decades, some are relatively new. Among them is the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber (SJMC), which celebrates its fifth anniversary this September, making it the newest medical journal published in Serbia.

ABOUT THE SERBIAN JOURNAL OF THE MEDICAL CHAMBER

In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic brought the entire world to a halt, causing an unprecedented global health crisis. In addition to resulting in grave casualties, paralyzing economies, and putting tremendous pressure on healthcare systems worldwide, the pandemic had an additional effect. Yet again, it reminded the world of the supreme importance of clinical practice and medical science. One could safely say that the pandemic has proven that the true superheroes of our time are healthcare workers and medical scientists. This is why each new journal offering medical professionals and researchers a platform to present the findings of their scientific and clinical work is of exceptional importance, as shared knowledge in the medical field provides valuable opportunities for professional growth and improvement.

One such journal is the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber (SJMC), published by the Medical Chamber of Serbia, with the University of Belgrade Institute for Medical Research as co-publisher. Since its first issue, published five years ago, amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, the Journal has grown, overcoming numerous challenges [43].

The Journal is available in print and electronic format. It annually publishes no less than forty unpublished, original scientific research articles, review articles, professional papers, short communications, editorials, meta-analyses, case reports, and other types of articles. This is a bilingual publication – each article is published in both Serbian and English [43].

The Journal covers all areas of medicine, pharmacy, and dental medicine. The Editorial Board carefully selects manuscripts to ensure that high-quality articles covering the widest range of relevant topics are published in each issue. The Journal releases four issues annually [43].

The Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber is published under an open-access policy using a double-blind peer-review process. Readers have open, free-of-charge, and unlimited access to all articles immediately upon online publication. There are also no fees for article submission or processing [43]. This is exceptionally valuable to young researchers, as the Journal provides full support throughout the entire process, completely free of charge – beginning with a detailed peer review process, which provides authors with valuable feedback; continuing with complete and detailed editing, proofreading, and translation services, which include consultations with the authors during the process to ensure absolute precision and high quality of the text; and concluding with high-level technical editing. As a result, each quarter, the readers are presented with a selection of high-quality, relevant articles covering a wide range of current topics.

Eminent national and international academicians, professors, and experts constitute the Editorial Board, Advisory Board, and Editorial Office [43]. Experienced and proven experts in specific medical fields are selected as reviewers. The joint expertise, experience, and dedication of all these professionals constitute the foundation upon which the Journal is built, while the innovative and dedicated work of the authors who entrust their articles to the Journal has made it what it is today.

The Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber has received the M54 categorization from the Ministry of Science, Technological Development, and Innovation of the Republic of Serbia. It is indexed by the Serbian Citation Index, and data on the Journal can be found on KoBSON [43].

While most of its issues strive to provide variety, certain issues of the Journal have been dedicated to particular topics and areas, thus responding to current trends, circumstances, and events.

Accordingly, responding to one of the greatest global public health challenges in modern history, the Journal dedicated an entire issue (Volume 2, No. 3, September 2021) to the COVID-19 pandemic, showcasing relevant clinical experiences and medical research in this particular field. This issue of the Journal contains invited papers written by eminent experts from different medical fields presenting the experience and knowledge that guided them in their clinical practice during the COVID-19 pandemic [46].

Additionally, the thematic issue – Hematology (Volume 5, No. 3) is fully dedicated to hemato-oncological diseases and the challenges in establishing their diagnosis and modern therapeutic modalities [47].

Furthermore, the Journal has issued five books of abstracts for the following congresses (symposiums):

• National congress with international participation Infections – Challenges in Diagnosis and Management
• National congress with international participation Infections in Immunocompromised – Problems of Recognition, Diagnosis, and Therapy
• National symposium with international participation Infarctions in Clinical Practice
• National congress 6th Congress of Hematologists of Serbia
• National congress with international participation Clinical Manifestations of Autoimmune Diseases [48],[49],[50],[51],[52].

The Journal, however, primarily provides a platform for a wide range of nationally, regionally, and internationally relevant medical issues and public health concerns.

Articles published in the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber to date – breakdown and concise analysis

Review method

A review of the issues of the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber published to date (excluding the books of abstracts listed above) provides insight into the overall number of papers published, the types of articles, the areas of medicine that the published articles pertain to, as well as the affiliations of the authors.

The review was performed by careful and detailed analysis of the contents of each issue to date, with attention to recording four categories of data:

• total number of articles per issue;
• author affiliation, i.e., whether the article was written by domestic authors (authors affiliated to Serbian institutions), international (foreign) authors (authors affiliated to institutions outside Serbia), or whether the article was written as a collaboration between domestic and international authors (and institutions);
• number of different types of articles published (as categorized in the Contents of each issue);
• field of medicine and/or type of medical issue addressed in the article.

Authors were classified as domestic or international based on their institutional affiliation, rather than their nationality

So as to tailor the review in such a way as to best reflect the overall content of the twenty issues of the Journal, categories pertaining to the field of medicine, i.e., medical issues addressed in the articles, were not predefined. Rather, they were formulated during the review based on the content of the articles themselves, which was determined through careful deliberation of each article. A number of articles were recognized to span over more than one area/category, which was also noted and entered into the analysis, wherein each such article was analyzed and taken into account in each of these categories.

The books of abstracts were excluded from the review, and only the regular quarterly issues were included in the analysis.

All the data obtained from the analysis have been aggregated and are presented in the next section.

REVIEW RESULTS

A total of 216 articles were published in the first twenty issues of the Journal. Table 1 presents the number of articles published per issue and in total, as well as the average number of articles per year [46],[47],[53],[54],[55],[56],[57],[58],[59],[60],[61],[62],[63],[64],[65],[66],[67],[68],[69],[70].

Table 1. Number of articles published in the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber to date (per issue, in total, and on average per year)

Analysis of the affiliations of the authors of the published articles shows how many of the 216 papers were written by researchers from Serbia, how many were authored by international scientists, as well as how many papers were written in collaboration between Serbian and international authors. Table 2 provides insight into the affiliation of the authors of the articles per issue, as well as the overall number of articles written by domestic authors, international authors, and those written in collaboration between Serbian and international authors, to date [46],[47],[53],[54],[55],[56],[57],[58],[59],[60],[61],[62],[63],[64],[65],[66],[67],[68],[69],[70].

Table 2. Number of articles written by Serbian authors, international authors, and through collaboration between Serbian and international authors, published in the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber to date (per issue and in total)

As is apparent from the data presented in Table 2 and Graph 1, the majority (187; 86.6%) of the articles were written by authors affiliated with Serbian institutions, 14 (6.5%) were written by international researchers, while 15 (6.9%) articles were the result of a collaborative effort.

Graph 1. Articles published in the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber to date, by author affiliation (%)

Analysis of the categories of articles published in the past five years in the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber has revealed the types of papers published in the first twenty issues.

As presented in Table 3 and Graph 2, the majority of the articles published were original articles (82; 38%), review articles (62; 28.5%), and case studies/reports/ case series (48; 22.2%), followed by book reviews (7; 3.2%), current topic/in focus articles (5; 2.3%), history of medicine articles (4; 1.9%), letters to the editor (3; 1.4%), and professional articles (2; 0.9%). The remaining articles (1.6%) were: one report, two invited papers, of which one was a review article, as well as one editorial.

Table 3. Types of articles published in the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber to date (per issue and in total)

Graph 2. Articles published in the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber to date, by type (%)

Finally, over the past five years, the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber has covered a wide array of topics. Table 4 presents the articles covering different topics/fields of medicine/medical issues. The data are presented by issue and in total.

Table 4. Topics/medical fields/medical issues covered by the articles published to date in the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber (per issue and in total)

Additionally, throughout all the issues to date, several articles have been identified to cover at least two medical fields, i.e., issues simultaneously. This has also been documented and marked accordingly in Table 4.

As presented in Table 4 and Graph 3, the topics/areas generating the highest interest among researchers publishing in the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber in the past five years have been the following: hematology and hematological diseases (42; 19.4%), COVID-19 (26; 12%), gynecology/obstetrics/pregnancy/reproductive health (19; 8.8%), social medicine/ issues pertaining to healthcare and healthcare coverage/healthcare professionals/healthcare systems (17; 7.9%), orthopedics and orthopedic surgery (15; 6.9%), cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases/cardiothoracic surgery/vascular and endovascular surgery (14; 6.5%), oncology/malignancies/tumors (12; 5.6%), public health (8; 3.7%), general/abdominal surgery (7; 3.2%), and infectious diseases (other than COVID-19 and HIV/AIDS) (6; 2.8%). These are followed by other topics, including psychiatry and mental illnesses, pulmonology, radiology/imaging, and numerous other medical fields, issues, and topics [46],[47],[53],[54],[55],[56],[57],[58],[59],[60],[61],[62],[63],[64],[65],[66],[67],[68],[69],[70].

Graph 3. Topics/medical fields/medical issues covered by the articles published to date in the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber (%)

BRIEF ANALYSIS AND CONCLUSION

As can be seen from Table 1, the average number of articles published in the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber annually, thus far, is 43,2, which exceeds the minimum of 40 articles per annum. Bearing in mind the numerous challenges that have been put before the entire medical community during the COVID-19 pandemic and its aftermath, which was the time of the inception of the Journal, one might say that maintaining this level of commitment has been a success in itself.

As a new medical publication, and in the above-mentioned worldwide state of emergency, the Journal has also succeeded in eliciting and maintaining the interest of international authors as well as promoting collaboration between Serbian and international researchers and institutions.

The predominance of original articles published by the Journal, as well as a significant number of case reports and case studies from all fields of medicine speaks to the evident motivation of researchers to present their new findings and to entrust the results of their hard work to the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber, while the variety of article types is proof that the Journal can cover and accommodate the needs of researchers in different formats, at the same time providing a wide variety of information to the readers.

Finally, the demonstrated wide array of medical specialties, i.e., different medical issues presented by the articles in the Journal, as well as the fact that many of these articles span beyond just one area, represent another definite indicator of the Journal’s success in maintaining the interest and motivation of researchers to publish their work in the SJMC.

Celebrating the fifth anniversary of its first issue, the Serbian Journal of the Medical Chamber strives to complement the activity of other domestic medical journals with a longer tradition, but also to pave its own path and confirm its own tradition and worth. The first crucial steps have been made – the Journal has been on the list of categorized Serbian scientific journals issued by the Ministry of Science, Technological Development, and Innovation of the Republic of Serbia since 2023, maintaining its volume of published articles and the interest and motivation of authors. At the same time, a team of dedicated and skilled experts continues to tirelessly work on preserving and promoting the quality of this publication. All this is both a prerequisite for continued growth and advancement as well as proof that the right steps have been taken to this effect, which is, hopefully, an indicator of a promising future ahead.