Editor's Note

Article Outline

• Copyright

Welcome to the first issue in the second volume of Practical Radiation Oncology (PRO). In previous issues I have used this space to highlight specific papers, but in this short note I want to focus on the process of peer review.

Peer-review is a process of critical assessment by content experts to determine the suitability of a manuscript for publication. The practice of reviewing manuscripts for publication began in the early to mid-18th century when the Royal Societies of London and Edinburgh asked the advice of their members to help determine which manuscripts were worthy of publication. In the 21st century the peer-review process is considered essential to ensuring academic quality and most scientific publications rely on some form of peer review.

Peer review has, however, been criticized as ineffective, slow and prone to bias. As long as humans perform peer review, these criticisms are likely to persist to some degree. At PRO, with the help of the Senior Editors, I have done what I can to minimize these criticisms by using a completely electronic process, requiring short deadlines for reviewers and relying on a double-blind review process where the authors do not know who is reviewing their paper, nor do the reviewers know the identities of the authors. It is now 18 months since the first manuscript was submitted to PRO and enough time has passed to make some preliminary judgments on the success of the process.

Approximately 250 manuscripts have been submitted to PRO since July 2010. The median time to first decision is approximately 3-4 weeks and the acceptance rate is about 35%. The majority of papers are original articles. I am particularly proud of the short time to first decision; this is evidence that the Senior Editors are committed to this effort. With the help of our publisher Elsevier, PRO is in the process of applying for MEDLINE indexing; we hope to have a decision from the National Library of Medicine by the end of 2012. If granted MEDLINE listing, all content will be retrospectively listed in MEDLINE.

All of the submitted manuscripts have been reviewed by at least 2 people (usually 3 or 4). Since July 2010, more than 250 of your peers have reviewed a manuscript for PRO (see page 73). These reviewers come from all over the world and work in a variety of settings (academic, community, Veteran's Affairs, government). In this issue is a comprehensive list of all of the reviewers. I am grateful for the voluntary contributions of these individuals. I cannot thank them enough and I ask you to thank them as well. These volunteers provide a valuable service without which PRO could not function.

I am particularly grateful for the hard work of several individuals who have provided multiple, constructive, timely reviews. The names of these exemplary reviewers are provided below:

In 2012, as the second volume of PRO begins I want to again thank ASTRO, the Senior Editors, Katherine Egan Bennett and the editorial team and, of course, my family for the support provided. I would like to specifically acknowledge 2 of our original Senior Editors, Anthony Zietman and Gillian Duchesne, who are stepping down from the editorial board. Their involvement and guidance during the start-up phase is much appreciated. I am also thrilled to be welcoming 3 new Senior Editors, Paul Nguyen, Todd Pawlicki and Lynn Wilson, who joined late last year to help us with this next phase of the journal's success.

I encourage all authors with clinically oriented, practical manuscripts to consider submitting their work to PRO. Furthermore, I ask authors and readers to consider volunteering your time to act as a reviewer for PRO. As always, I welcome your feedback and input. Please feel free to contact me through the PRO email address (PRO@astro.org) or in person.