“Learning and innovation go hand in hand. The arrogance of success is to think that what you did yesterday will be sufficient for tomorrow.”
–William Pollard, ∼1870
As we approach the end of the 2019 calendar year, we wish all of our readers, authors, and reviewers a healthy and prosperous new year. During 2019, the Journal of Vascular Surgery: Cases and Innovative Techniques (JVS-CIT) has continued to expand and become an even more significant publication for those physicians who manage vascular diseases. It allows innovators to document the development of new devices, and it also allows authors to discuss unusual cases that teach us how to handle complex or rare clinical problems. JVS-CIT is an important component of the Journal of Vascular Surgery publications, which includes the Journal of Vascular Surgery (JVS), our arterial disease journal, the Journal of Vascular Surgery: Venous and Lymphatic Disorders (JVS-VL), our venous and lymphatic disease journal, the Journal of Vascular Surgery: Cases and Innovative Techniques (JVS-CIT), our journal for new techniques and unusual cases, and our newest journal, JVS Vascular Science (JVS-VS), devoted to basic and translational vascular research.
We believe that each of our journals has value to vascular specialists, although many in our specialty have become subspecialized and will focus their research and reading on only one of these four journals, while many others will find benefit in reading the publications in each journal. In addition to separating our four journals by topic and research interest, a major initiative implemented this year is the division of our single submission and peer review website into separate sites for each journal. The result is that authors may now submit their papers to the journal of their choice, rather than waiting for the editor to assign it at the end of the review process.
Case reports and innovative techniques papers can be submitted for consideration to both JVS-VL or JVS-CIT.
Other important developments involve the continuing major expansion of our social media program. Our two major clinical journals that publish clinical series, JVS and JVS-VL, have a short video produced for each issue, introducing four exceptional and impactful articles selected by the editors. These articles are also associated with a “Visual Abstract”, a small pictorial representation of the article's key message, which is shared widely on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Visual Abstracts allow readers to rapidly determine their interest in reading the full article. There is also a link to the full, free to read article for the first 2 months of publication. The quality of the Visual Abstracts will be enhanced with the beautiful illustrations of renowned emeritus Mayo Clinic artist David Factor.
We are also developing a budding relationship with “Audible Bleeding”, a very successful podcast for physicians with an interest in vascular disease. The podcast interviews authors, leaders in the vascular field, and journal editors; we are pleased to be invited to participate, when requested, in discussing some of our best papers. As our social media program grows, we plan to use it to disseminate great case reports and innovative technique papers published in JVS-CIT.
Another important initiative is our effort to standardize the peer review process by using templates for new reviewers, available at https://bit.ly/2YDiqJz. Templates make sure the same issues are considered when reviewing each paper. The template should also result in more systematic feedback to authors, help revisions, and improve consistency in the review process. This standardization is helpful at a time when there has been a record increase in the number of manuscript submissions to the Journal of Vascular Surgery Publications. Time from submission to publication should also continue to decrease, thanks to additional administrative support we received from the Society for Vascular Surgery.
Progress would not have been possible without our excellent editorial staff, Tyler Cosgrove and Carlee Green, Managing Editor Alexandria Sese of JVS-VL, and by our stellar Senior Managing Editor of all four journals, Jessica McEwan. For their help, enthusiasm, expertise, and hard work, we are extremely grateful.
In sum, our Journals continue to grow in volume and improve in quality. We greatly appreciate the valuable contributions of our expert associate and assistant editors, our superb editorial boards, our excellent reviewers, and all our contributing authors around the world. It takes a team effort to make the advances that have occurred over the past years.
Acknowledgment of reviewers
Peer review plays an essential role in scientific publishing. Peer reviewers validate the credibility of scientific research, they improve the quality of the manuscripts, and they provide valuable input to the editors to make key decisions on the fate of the manuscripts. Peer reviewers unselfishly provide their time and expertise to our Journals, our societies and our publisher. For all their efforts, we are extremely grateful.
Acknowledgment of associate and assistant editors
We would like to acknowledge our excellent Associate and Assistant Editors who helped us in 2019 to deal with the increasing number of submissions, without compromising the high quality of the articles published in JVS. Drs Thomas L. Forbes and Fred A. Weaver served as Associate Editors for Clinical Studies and made key decisions on hundreds of manuscripts. We are thankful for the expert contributions of our Associate Editor for Basic Science, Dr Alan Dardik, who also starts now in his new role as Editor of JVS-VS. We are indebted to Dr Keith Calligaro, for his insightful and witty comments and great summaries of the Vascular Vantage Point: Review and Commentary of Key Non-JVS Publications. We are thankful to Dr Michael C. Dalsing for his expert help as Assistant Editor of Reviews.
As discussed in our editorial, Dr Paul J. DiMuzio, Editor for Social Media and Press Releases, with the help of newly elected assistant editor Dr Daniel Han, increased our on-line readership tremendously on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter and with the production of press releases, Visual Abstracts and the JVS Journal club.
Acknowledgment of the editorial board
We are thankful for the valuable contributions made by our excellent Editorial Board in 2019. In addition to the review and re-review of a large number of original articles, our editorial board members frequently contributed to JVS with commentaries and editorials. Members of the Editorial Board performed an average of 15 reviews each year and during 2019, this accounted for 31% of all the reviews performed.
The Editors would like to recognize the significant contributions of those Editorial Board members who, after many years of valuable service, will be retiring from the Board this month. We also would like to welcome the new members of the Editorial Board of JVS and JVS-CIT, who will start their assignments in January of 2020.
Continuing board members
Ahmed M. Abou-Zamzam
Christopher J. Abularrage
Jose Ignacio Almeida
Zachary M. Arthurs
Adam W. Beck
Haraldur Bjarnason
Stephen WK Cheng
Jayer Chung
Daniel G. Clair
Anthony J. Comerota
David L. Dawson
Ellen Dillavou
Hasan Haldun Dosluoglu
Matthew J. Dougherty
Luc Dubois
Audra A. Duncan
Matthew J. Eagleton
Hans-Henning Eckstein
Eric David Endean
Luke S. Erdoes
Alik Farber
Spencer Galt
Hugh Gelabert
Jerry Goldstone
Philip P. Goodney
Linda Harris
Karl A. Illig
Glenn R. Jacobowitz
William D. Jordan Jr.
Vikram S. Kashyap
Nicos Labropoulos
Gregory J. Landry
Byung-Boong Lee
Thomas F. Lindsay
G. Matthew Longo
Fedor Lurie
Thomas G. Lynch
M. Ashraf Mansour
William A. Marston
Tara M. Mastracci
George H. Meier
Joseph L. Mills
J. Gregory Modrall
A. Ross Naylor
Gustavo S. Oderich
Thomas F. O'Donnell
Takao Ohki
Marc A. Passman
Robert B. Patterson
Lakshmikumar Pillai
Thomas M. Proebstle
William J. Quinones-Baldrich
Eberhard Rabe
Joseph D. Raffetto
Ravi R. Rajani
Seshadri Raju
Timothy A. Resch
Michael J. Rohrer
Eva M. Rzucidlo
Russell H. Samson
Andres Schanzer
Marc L. Schermerhorn
Joseph R. Schneider
Lewis B. Schwartz
Claudie McArthur Sheahan
Jeffrey J. Siracuse
Matthew R. Smeds
Gale L. Tang
Gilbert R. Upchurch
R. James Valentine
André M. Van Rij
Thomas W. Wakefield
Jonathan Michael Weiswasser
Cees Wittens
Karen Woo
Retiring board members
John A. Curci
Lois A. Killewich
Michael P. Lilly
Peter R. Nelson
Ulka Sachdev
New board members
Pier Luigi Antignani
Faisal Aziz
Iris Baumgartner
John Blebea
Patrick Carpentier
Jose Antonio Diaz
Luke S. Erdoes
Sergio Gianesini
Manjit S. Gohel
Anil Hingorani
Mark D. Iafrati
Manju Kalra
Vikram S. Kashyap
Pedro Pablo Komlós
Nick Morrison
Patrick Muck
Thomas Noppeney
Kurosh Parsi
Lars Rasmussen
Benjamin Ware Starnes
David H. Stone
Tomasz Urbanek
Mark S. Whiteley
Distinguished reviewers
The Editors would like to recognize the Distinguished Reviewers of the Journal of Vascular Surgery, who have performed more than five reviews during 2019 and consistently performed the highest-rated and timely reviews. Distinguished Reviewers contributed 37% of all reviews. We thank their efforts to assure a high-quality peer-review process.
Ali F. AbuRahma
Jose Ignacio Almeida
Thomas E. Brothers
Ruth L. Bush
Anthony J. Comerota
Caitlin W. Hicks
Nicos Labropoulos
Byung-Boong Lee
Fedor Lurie
William C. Mackey
Wesley S. Moore
Woosup Michael Park
Joseph D. Raffetto
Seshadri Raju
Michael J Singh
W. Charles Sternbergh III
Shirling Tsai
R. James Valentine
Andre M. Van Rij
Thomas W. Wakefield
Jonathan Michael Weiswasser
Amir Azarbal
April J. Boyd
Charles James Fox
Alexander Gombert
Elisa Greco
Sung Wan Ham
E. John Harris
Karem Harth
Sharon C Kiang
Gary W Lemmon
Sebastian Mafeld
Gregory A Magee
Andrea Tara Obi
Kosmas I. Paraskevas
George Theodore Pisimisis
alessandra puggioni
Salvatore Scali
Jordan R. Stern
Michael Clinton Stoner
Matthew Sweet
Andrew L. Tambyraja
Areck Ucuzian
Edward Woo
Eleftherios S. Xenos
James B. Alexander
Joseph Patrick. Archie
Donald Baril
Carlos Fares Bechara
Jean-Pierre Becquemin
Michael Belkin
Daniel J. Bertges
Jan D. Blankensteijn
Benjamin Sands Brooke
Piergiorgio Cao
Ankur Chandra
Jae Sung Cho
Dawn Marie Coleman
John D. Corson
Randall R. DeMartino
Ellen Dillavou
Magruder C. Donaldson
John F. Eidt
Richard J. Fowl
Julie A. Freischlag
Robert P. Garvin
Randolph P. Guzman
Joseph Patrick Hart
Peter K. Henke
Norman R. Hertzer
Anil Hingorani
Justin Hurie
Daniel M. Ihnat
Glenn R. Jacobowitz
Arjun Jayaraj
Manju Kalra
Steven G. Katz
Mark Koelemay
Ted R. Kohler
Ralf R Kolvenbach
Larry W Kraiss
Timothy F. Kresowik
Evan C. Lipsitz
Robyn Macsata
Jesse Manunga
Robert A. McCready
Gregory L. Moneta
Albeir Mousa
Firas Fuad Mussa
Stuart I. Myers
David G. Neschis
Richard F. Neville
Thomas F. O'Donnell
Patrick J. O'Hara
Frank T. Padberg
Janet T. Powell
Eberhard Rabe
John E. Rectenwald
Robert Y Rhee
Michael A. Ricci
John J. Ricotta
David Andrew Rigberg
Daniel S. Rush
Eva M. Rzucidlo
Shawn Sarin
Shoaib Shafique
Niten Singh
Paul C. Tang
Boulos Toursarkissian
Gerald S. Treiman
Daniel B. Walsh
Jerry R. Youkey
Reviewers
The Editors are grateful to many clinicians and scientists who performed at least one review for the Journal during 2019. This group includes several New Reviewers. These reviewers performed 32% of all reviews and contributed greatly to our peer-review process. We would like to express our gratitude to them and look forward to working with them and with many more new reviewers in 2020.
Babak Abai
Cherrie Zack Abraham
Julie Adams
Mujtaba M. Ali
Dean J Arnaoutakis
Joshua David Arnold
Shipra Arya
Robert G. Atnip
Faisal Aziz
Ali Azizzadeh
Trissa Babrowski
Martin R. Back
Jeffrey L. Ballard
Dennis F. Bandyk
Neal R Barshes
Jonathan Bath
B. Timothy Baxter
Hernan A Bazan
Jaime Benarroch-Gampel
Thomas M. Bergamini
Scott S. Berman
Haraldur Bjarnason
James Hamilton Black
John Blebea
William Todd Bohannon
Thomas C. Bower
Luke P Brewster
Kellie R. Brown
Jacob Buth
John Stephen Byrne
Richard P. Cambria
Neal Scott Cayne
Rabih Antoine Chaer
Elliot L. Chaikof
Venita Chandra
Jerry C Chen
Gregory S Cherr
Kenneth J. Cherry
David K.W. Chew
Lori Choi
Timothy A.M. Chuter
William Darrin Clouse
Philip D. Coleridge-Smith
Mark Frederick Conrad
Michael S Conte
Matthew A. Corriere
Scott Michael Damrauer
Rachel Danczyk
R. Clement Darling III
Mark G. Davies
Charles de Mestral
Christian de Virgilio
Nuno V Dias
Anton Dias Perera
Jose Antonio Diaz
Matthew Doyle
Jonothan J. Earnshaw
Matthew S Edwards
Jens Eldrup-Jorgensen
Jonathan Eliason
Bruce M Elliott
James R. Elmore
Guillermo A Escobar
Mark K. Eskandari
Mohammad H. Eslami
Darwin Eton
Ronald M. Fairman
Steven Farley
Robert J Feezor
Bram Fioole
Katherine Ann Gallagher
Nitin Garg
Warren J Gasper
Robert H. Geelkerken
Patrick J. Geraghty
Sergio Gianesini
Kristina Ann Giles
Heather L Gill
David L. Gillespie
Jonathan Golledge
Carlee Green
Raul J. Guzman
Robert I Hacker
Eric S Hager
Allen David Hamdan
Jaap Hamming
Sukgu M Han
John P. Harris
Heitham T. Hassoun
Dean A. Healy
nasim hedayati
Ulf Hedin
Jamal J Hoballah
Kim J. Hodgson
Larry Horesh
Kathryn L Howe
Thomas S. Huber
Kakra Hughes
Glenn C. Hunter
Mark D. Iafrati
Jeffrey Indes
Takehisa Iwai
Benjamin M Jackson
Michael J.H.M. Jacobs
Donald L. Jacobs
Houman Jalaie
Jeffrey Jim
Jason M. Johanning
Douglas W Jones
Tilo Kolbel
Lowell Stuart Kabnick
Corey Andrew Kalbaugh
Jeanwan Kang
Ahmed Kayssi
Lois A. Killewich
Melissa L Kirkwood
Martyn Knowles
Kimihiro Komori
Panos Kougias
Norman Kumins
James Laredo
W. Anthony Lee
Jason T. Lee
Christos D Liapis
Timothy K. Liem
Judith C. Lin
Peter H. Lin
Bengt Lindblad
Bo Liu
Melissa Loja
Joseph Vincent Lombardi
Ying Wei Lum
Sean P. Lyden
Thanila Macedo
Michel S. Makaroun
Mahmoud Malas
Thomas Sabatini Maldonado
William A. Marston
Elna M. Masuda
Graeme McFarland
James F. McKinsey
James Thomas McPhee
Manish Mehta
Matthew W Mell
Matthew Thomas Menard
Ross Milner
Marc E Mitchell
Tetsuro Miyata
Colleen Moore
Nicholas Morrissey
Raghu L Motaganahalli
Deidra Hopkins Mountain
Patrick Muck
Satish C. Muluk
Shardul Bal Nagre
Aravinda Nanjundappa
Naiem Nassiri
A. Ross Naylor
April Estelle Nedeau
Louis L. Nguyen
Cassius Iyad Ochoa Chaar
Sean D. O'Donnell
Kenneth Ouriel
Maral Ouzounian
Jean M. Panneton
Marc A Passman
Virendra I Patel
Tomas Pfeiffer
Danielle Marie Pineda
Iraklis I. Pipinos
Aleksandra Policha
Amani Politano
Frank B. Pomposelli
Lori Pounds
Richard J. Powell
Thomas M. Proebstle
Brandon Propper
Mohammad Qadura
Elina Quiroga
Kathleen Raman
Bala Ramanan
Muhammad Ali A Rana
Amy B Reed
Judith G. Regensteiner
Thomas Reifsnyder
Linda M. Reilly
Addi Rizvi
William P. Robinson
Jacob G Robison
Bernardino Castelo Branco Rocha
Graham Roche-Nagle
Johnathon Curtis Rollo
Vincent L. Rowe
Jean Marie Ruddy
Richard J. Sanders
Steven M. Santilli
Bhagwan Satiani
Larry A. Scher
Sherry D Scovell
Raffaele Serra
Charles J. Shanley
Malachi G. Sheahan
Cynthia K. Shortell
Kota Shukuzawa
Jessica P Simons
Christopher Lowther Skelly
Emily Spangler
Oren K. Steinmetz
Patrick A Stone
Julianne Stoughton
Luis Suarez
Bjoern Dominik Suckow
Bauer E. Sumpio
Scott M Surowiec
David Szalay
Tze-Woei Tan
Yuefeng Tang
Pedro G. Teixeira
Robert W. Thompson
Bryan Tillman
Carlos H. Timaran
Jan H.M. Tordoir
Giovanni Torsello
Magdiel Trinidad Hernandez
Ramesh Kaushal Tripathi
Douglas Alan Troutman
Maarten Truijers
Brant W. Ullery
Suresh Vedantham
Ravi Kumar Veeraswamy
Omaida C. Velazquez
Gabriela Velazquez-Ramirez
Chandu Vemuri
Gian Franco Veraldi
Eric Wahlberg
Grace J Wang
Craig Weinkauf
Mark Wheatcroft
John V. White
Michael Stephen Williams
Cees Wittens
Dai Yamanouchi
Kak Khee Yeung
Paolo Zamboni
Wei Zhou
Kenneth Richard Ziegler
Eugene Zierler
Statistical reviewers
Finally, the Editors thank our statistical reviewers, who performed nearly 150 reviews in 2019.
Richard Amdur
William Scott Harmsen
Jay Mandrekar
Charles Miller
Edward Joseph Mascha