| HOME | HELP | FEEDBACK | SUBSCRIPTIONS | ARCHIVE | SEARCH | TABLE OF CONTENTS |
|
|
|
|||||||
|
|||||||||
|
Interact CardioVasc Thorac Surg 2005;4:1-2. doi:10.1510/icvts.2005.106989 © 2005 European Association of Cardio-Thoracic Surgery
ICVTS brings virtual conferencing to CTSNetDepartment of Cardio-vascular Surgery, Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois, CHUV Rue du Bugnon 46 CH-1011 Lausanne, Switzerland *Tel: +41 21 314 22 79; fax: +41 21 314 22 80. E-mail address: ludwig.von-segesser{at}chuv.hospvd.ch http://www.cardiovasc.net. With the inclusion of Interactive CardioVascular and Thoracic Surgery (www.icvts.org) in the CTSnet Journal collection (www.ctsnet.org/journals) by January 1, 2005, virtual conferencing is now an integral part of CTSnet. Virtual conferencing on Interactive CardioVascular and Thoracic Surgery (ICVTS) allows not only for fast track publication of scientific findings, but also for concurrent public discussion of the material presented on the World Wide Web prior to production of a hard copy in print. In contrast to the traditional publication mode, which includes abstract submission, presentation and discussion at a meeting, publication in a scientific journal and final print of the correspondence referring to the original publication, a process which usually takes one (e.g. submission in October 2003, published in March 2004 [1], corresponding letter to the editor published in December 2004 [2]) or more years, virtual conferencing by the formula used by ICVTS allows for compression of all the steps mentioned above to a few months (e.g. submission in April 2002, printed with corresponding discussion in September 2002 [3]). ICVTS was founded by the European Association for Cardio-thoracic Surgery (EACTS: www.eacts.org) in 2002 [4], and is by now also published by EACTS. ICVTS is designed to take advantage of the much faster communication possibilities made available through the internet. The latter not only allows for rapid availability of content including text, images, sound and video around the globe, but also various forms of feedback mechanisms within a very short time frame. At this time, the publication concept established by ICVTS includes submission of scientific manuscripts in the fields of thoracic, cardiac, and vascular surgery as well as related topics for peer review, immediate pre-publication for accepted papers (after appropriate revision if deemed necessary) on www.icvts.org for a 28 day discussion period with the possibility for edited comments and replies by the authors, transfer of all, the publication together with its discussion, to the electronic archives concurrently with the production of a traditional journal in print. The feedback mechanisms outlined above [5] made it possible to somewhat broaden the scope of ICVTS in comparison to the traditional paper based scientific journals. Hence, we encourage among others submissions of ‘New ideas’ in a relatively early stage in order to solicit the input of additional brains. ‘Work in progress reports’ are designed to communicate on design iterations of devices, modifications of surgical procedures, communication of intermediate results etc. Publication of ‘Nomenclature’ and ‘Protocols’ can help for adjustments as well for recruitment of participating centres. ‘Follow-up papers’ studies can confirm previous reports and/or provide additional information. ‘Institutional reports’ are intended to provide a possibility for publishing what is actually done in various areas of the world, which is not necessarily the same as what is promoted by neither the leading institutions nor the guidelines. Most importantly, ICVTS supports the publication of ‘Bail-out procedures’ and reports on ‘Negative results’, two categories which are not so popular among authors for a number of reasons. Reporting on successes certainly seems more rewarding in science and this is even more so in surgery, where failures are easily associated with errors in indications or lack of surgical skills, an image which is not exactly helpful for patient recruitment. However, reporting of failed scientific studies is known for preventing similar errors in the future, and this certainly holds also true for surgical procedures which tend to fail. An additional hurdle has to be overcome for Bail-out procedures where by definition the patient numbers are small and therefore large study populations will never be reached. Although there is a general saying, that we can learn more from failures than from successes, it has to be accepted here, that for this field, the highest degree of evidence which is based on randomized trials [6] can probably never be reached. This is due to the fact, that nobody right in its mind would recruit patients for a trial, which is designed to optimize failures in order to establish failures at a higher degree of evidence. However, there are techniques for assessing critical issues in the field of thoracic, cardiac and vascular surgery like the ‘Best Evidence Topics’ or ‘BestBETS’ format which was introduced by ICVTS in 2003 [7]. ‘BestBETS’ are designed to scrutinize the available information on a specific topic relevant for thoracic, cardiac and vascular surgeons by a clearly defined search strategy and a systematic and robust analysis. For more, just go to www.ctsnet.org, click journals, Interactive CardioVascular and Thoracic Surgery (www.icvts.org), and hit ‘BestBETS’. Like all recent ICVTS papers, ‘Best BETS’ are open for discussion for 28 days, prior to production in traditional print format of both, the ‘Best BETS’ and your comments. Looking forward to reading YOU at www.icvts.org!
This article has been cited by other articles:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| HOME | HELP | FEEDBACK | SUBSCRIPTIONS | ARCHIVE | SEARCH | TABLE OF CONTENTS |
| ANN THORAC SURG | ASIAN CARDIOVASC THORAC ANN | EUR J CARDIOTHORAC SURG |
| J THORAC CARDIOVASC SURG | ICVTS | ALL CTSNet JOURNALS |
Top
References
