INTRODUCTION
Targeting medical students, residents, and attending physicians, the Journal of Medical Insights (JOMI) is designed to systematically produce and make available high-quality, peer-reviewed surgical videos. At present the journal is focused on developing content in orthopedics, orthopedic trauma, and general surgery. Surgical procedures are selected for inclusion in the journal based on educational guidelines established by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education and procedure volume data from professional surgical organizations.
Currently, the journal has 6 surgical specialty modules, with a seventh in development, containing 34 available videos, plus 13 in production and 100 planned. JOMI refers to its content as “video-articles,” and each video features a surgical procedure narrated by a physician along with a “Case Overview” outlining patient history, details of the physical exam, treatment options, preoperative and postoperative images, outcomes, and a discussion. The overview includes tips for practitioners related to the patient history and physical exam. Also, accompanying each video is a “Procedure Outline,” a text description of the filmed procedure from pre-procedural planning to the postoperative protocol.
In addition to providing detailed supportive educational content, JOMI incorporates a social networking component into each video-article. The “Share this Article” feature allows viewers to easily share a link to the journal's content via email or several social networking platforms, including Tumblr, Facebook, and Twitter. JOMI promotes discussion of its content through a comment section at the end of each video-article, which is available to all subscribers, and a blog.
ACCESS
JOMI is a web-based resource that is compatible with hypertext markup language 5 (HTML5) and Adobe Flash. While the default setting for the journal's visual content is high definition, subscribers can also view surgical procedures in standard definition. This reviewer watched six videos in their entirety in high definition, and all started immediately and played with no discernable lag. Individual subscribers and institutions with high-speed Internet access should anticipate similar experiences.
SEARCHING
Upon logging into JOMI, users encounter an introductory screen featuring a list of the journal's seven content areas, as well as an “All Article” index, a comprehensive list of all available video-articles. This home screen also includes an article index that lists all videos by specialty, including those that are planned or in production. This topical structure allows users to search for content via distinct specialties and browse all available video-articles easily from the journal's home page. Video-articles appear to be listed by date of production within the content areas. This arrangement helps users find new content serendipitously, but it can make it more difficult to find video-articles on a specific procedure. This problem is compounded when browsing the “All Articles” module. Users can find relevant articles more easily by using the article index; although it is not alphabetized, it is easy to scan by specialty. The index includes direct links to available articles, making it a superior aid for finding specific content. Users can also search for articles by keyword via a search box at the top of every page.
CONCLUSION
JOMI offers an intuitive interface, excellent video production values, and detailed educational content, with no installation or maintenance requirements. The focus on providing high-quality, full-length content makes JOMI stand out among other surgical video resources such as Surgery Theater and WebSurg, which feature shorter videos with comparatively lower production quality. JOMI's video-article format and extensive supplemental educational and practice-based materials differentiate the journal from free surgical video resources like Surgery Theater and VuMedi that do not include detailed, text-based content. However, at present the content is limited, with only 34 video-articles, 62% of which are in orthopedics. Overall, JOMI provides high-quality content in the limited disciplines covered.