Article Text
Statistics from Altmetric.com
BMJ Open Ophthalmology was launched in autumn 2016. Its remit is to provide an open-access platform for basic, translational and clinical research in ophthalmology and vision Science.
BMJ Open Ophthalmology aims to:
Publish a broad range of articles of particular clinical, scientific, educational or surgical value on a rapid publication schedule.
Facilitate a close interaction between basic, translational and clinical sciences through publication and fostering interdisciplinary research.
Provide an interactive digital platform that is freely available, unrestricted and immediately accessible.
Provoke scientific debate and clinical commentary in which the readership, authors and public can engage and contribute through both social and multimedia.
Since its launch, the journal has grown significantly, with submitted and accepted papers increasing from 61 and 16 in 2016, to 136 and 59 in 2019 (figure 1), with an overall acceptance rate of 44%. It has also seen a steady increase in the transfer of good quality papers from other BMJ journals.
BMJ Open Ophthalmology has attracted an international authorship with 18% of papers from Europe, 17% from the USA and 16% from Japan, China and India combined.
The mean (median) time to a first decision has reduced from 47 (43) days in 2016 to 40 (20) days in 2019. The mean time from acceptance to online publication is 23 days.
As an open access journal, BMJ Open Ophthalmology has seen a substantial rise in the number of article downloads from around the world. At the time of writing, the top 10 most downloaded papers in 2019 had been accessed a total of 26 537 times . The number of citations BMJ Open Ophthalmology articles have received has correspondingly increased from 4 in 2017 to 136 in 2019. BMJ Open Ophthalmology is indexed in the following major databases: Web of Science Core Collection: Emerging Sources Citation Index, PubMed Central, DOAJ, Google Scholar, and Scopus.
Patient and public partnership
Taking the lead from The BMJ’s innovative patient partnership strategy, BMJ Open Ophthalmology encourages authors to partake in similar schemes. As such, authors submitting research papers are required to include a ‘Patient and Public Involvement Statement’ within the methods section of their paper, describing how they involved patients and the public in their research. BMJ Open Ophthalmology believes that partnering with patients, their carers, support networks and the public is an ethical imperative and essential to improving the quality, safety, value and sustainability of health systems and research.
Data sharing
Sharing the full datasets underlying the results in your article brings many benefits. It enables reuse, reduces research waste and promotes collaboration. Greater transparency increases trust in research results by allowing results to be independently verified. These benefits lead to a more reliable evidence base and a healthier world. In line with The BMJ, BMJ Open Ophthalmology encourages authors to make available as much of the underlying data from their articles as possible (without compromising participant privacy), but the least that is required is the minimum data required to reproduce the results presented in the associated article.
BMJ Open Ophthalmology considers any files generated by authors’ research as constituting relevant data. This may be raw or processed data. Examples include (but are not limited to) individual-level de-identified patient data, survey results, interview transcripts, statistical codes, images, videos, spreadsheets, audio files, text files and imaging and scan files.
Editorial board
The editorial board has grown to include Associate Editors from USA, Japan, the UK and India, with expert representation from all areas of ophthalmology, basic and clinical sciences, and vision science as listed below.
On behalf of the editorial team of BMJ Open Ophthalmology, we wish to thank you for your support of the journal since its launch, and we hope you will join us for the next phase of the journal’s development, whether as a reader, author or reviewer.
Editor-in-Chief
Professor Stephen B. Kaye, FRCS, FRCOphth, MD
University of Liverpool
Liverpool, UK
orcid.org/0000-0003-0390-0592
Editorial office: info.bmjophth@bmj.com
Associate Editors
Dr Gabriela Czanner, PhD
University of Liverpool
Liverpool, UK
orcid.org/0000-0002-1157-2093
Area of expertise: Biostatistics
Dr Bernhard Steger, MD
Medical University Innsbruck
Innsbruck, Austria
orcid.org/0000-0002-5316-4661
Area of expertise: Cataract and refractive surgery
Dr Vito Romano, MD
Royal Liverpool University Hospital
Liverpool, UK
orcid.org/0000-0002-5148-7643
Area of expertise: Cataract and refractive surgery
Dr Sajjad Ahmad
PhD, FRCOphth
Moorfields Eye Hospital
London, UK
orcid.org – not available
Area of expertise: Cornea and ocular surface
Professor Stephanie Watson
PhD, FRANZCO
Sydney Eye Hospital
Sydney, Australia
orcid.org/0000-0001-6699-1765
Area of expertise: Cornea and ocular surface
Professor Darlene A. Dartt, PhD
Harvard Medical School
Boston, MA, USA
orcid.org/0000-0002-0576-6932
Area of expertise: Cornea and ocular surface (basic science)
Dr Louise F. Porter, PhD, MSc, MBChB, PhD
University of Liverpool
Liverpool, UK
orcid.org/0000-0002-7406-0319
Area of expertise: Genetics
Dr Ryo Asaoka, MD, PhD
The University of Tokyo
Tokyo, Japan
orcid.org/0000-0001-7182-1912
Area of expertise: Glaucoma
Dr Shunsuke Nakakura, MD, PhD
Saneikai Tsukazaki Hospital
Himeji, Japan
orcid.org/0000-0002-1094-1862
Area of expertise: Glaucoma
Dr Kazunori Hirasawa, MD
Kitasato University
Tokyo, Japan
orcid.org/0000-0001-5100-005X
Area of expertise: Glaucoma
Dr David Yorston, MBChB, FRCOphth, FRCOphth
NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde
Glasgow, UK
orcid.org/0000-0001-7259-5320
Area of expertise: Global ophthalmology and retina
Ms Savitha Madhusudhan, MBBS, DO, FRCOphth
Royal Liverpool and Broadgreen University Hospital
Liverpool, UK
orcid.org/0000-0002-8203-0929
Area of expertise: Medical retina
Dr Kevin Hamill, PhD
University of Liverpool
Liverpool, UK
orcid.org/0000-0002-7852-1944
Area of expertise: Molecular ophthalmology
Professor Anat Galor, MD, MSPH, MD, MSPH
University of Miami
Miami, FL, USA
orcid.org/0000-0002-3026-6155
Area of expertise: Ocular surface
Dr Saaeha Rauz, PhD, FRCOphth
University of Birmingham
Birmingham, UK
orcid.org/0000-0003-4627-3496
Area of expertise: Ocular surface and translational research
Dr Yalin Zheng, PhD
University of Liverpool
Liverpool, UK
orcid.org/0000-0002-7873-0922
Area of expertise: Ocular imaging
Professor Bhupendra Patel, LRCP, MRCS, MBChB, DORCS, FRCS, FRCOphth
University of Utah
Salt Lake City, UT, USA
orcid.org/0000-0002-7873-0922
Area of expertise: Oculoplastics and orbit
Dr Ramesh Kekunnaya, MD
L V Prasad Eye Institute
Hyderabad, India
orcid.org/0000-0003-4673-8927
Area of expertise: Paediatric ophthalmology and strabismus
Professor David A. Eichenbaum, MD
Retina Vitreous Associates of Florida
Tampa, FL, USA
orcid.org/0000-0003-0654-0668
Area of expertise: Retina
Dr Michael Williams, MD, MRCOphth, MMedEd
Queens University Belfast
Belfast, UK
orcid.org/0000-0002-5051-5921
Area of expertise: Retina
Dr Sidney Schechet, MD
University of Chicago Medicine
Chicago, US
orcid.org/0000-0001-8996-3855
Area of expertise: Retina
Professor Baljean Dhillon, FRCS, FRCPS, FRCOphth
University of Edinburgh
Edinburgh, UK
orcid.org – not available
Area of expertise: Retina and neurology
Professor Conor Murphy, MBBChBAO, MMedSc, FRCSI, FRCOphth, PhD
Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland
Dublin, Ireland
orcid.org/0000-0003-2171-0418
Area of expertise: Uveitis and ocular inflammatory disease
Professor James Wolffsohn, BSc, PgCertHE, MBA, PhD, PFHEA, FRSB, FCOptom, FAAO
Aston University
Birmingham, UK
orcid.org/0000-0003-4673-8927
Area of expertise: Visual science
Social Media Editor
Dr Mariya Moosajee, MBBS, PhD, FRCOphth
University College London
London, UK
orcid.org/0000-0003-1688-5360
Area of expertise: Genetics
Twitter: @BMJ_Ophth
Footnotes
Contributors Authors own work.
Funding The authors have not declared a specific grant for this research from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.
Competing interests None declared.
Patient consent for publication Not required.
Provenance and peer review Commissioned; internally peer reviewed.