A new path for the UEG Journal

This first issue of 2021 marks a new beginning for the United European Gastroenterology Journal (UEG Journal) in the context of a new trainee editorial board, the affiliation to a new publishing company and with the growth of the social soul of UEGJ.

After the assignment of the Associate Editors in 2019, it is in fact now the time for a turnover of the Trainee Editors. With the prosperity of our journal in terms of received articles and the success of the Twitter account (@UEGJournal), the new board of Trainee Editors also grew from 6 to 10 members: seven specifically dedicated to the support of Associate Editors in the selection of the best received manuscripts, two acting in Search Engine Optimization (SEO) to improve the indexing of our journal articles, and one as our Social Media (SM) Editor to manage our Twitter profile page. ¹ Dragos Ciocan will be collaborating on the general and microbiome area, Alberto Zanetto on the liver area, Alexandre Nuzzo on the general and small bowel section, Livia Archibugi on the pancreas section, Chloé Melchior on the neurogastroenterology section, Iago Rodrìguez‐Lago on IBD, Diogo Libânio on the endoscopy section, Willem B. Brouwer and Marcus Hollenbach will act as SEO Editors, and Katarzyna Pawlak as SM Editor. With the support of this brand‐new group of young and motivated researchers, we believe that the UEG Journal will be able to keep up with the increase of the received manuscripts, with a 4‐fold increase between 2015 and 2020 while maintaining a good time frame between receiving the manuscript and completing the reviewing process (currently on average 9 days to first decision). We also believe the work of our SEOs will improve the indexing of papers on Google, boosting their visibility and enhance their impact. Finally, through our Twitter account we will maintain a fresh and smart communication of the most recent publications.

Over the last year, we could observe an increasing exploration of social media and its growing role in sharing information, promoting education, and creating a network among physicians and healthcare professionals. ² Surprisingly, the new virtual scientific activity transferred academic debate in social media corridors. ² We adopted this innovative approach by continuing @UEGJournal Twitter activity, first and foremost, to get close to our readers. ³ In the past 2 years, we connected with 2100 followers on Twitter. This showed the importance of social media adopted into the journal's natural life cycle.

In 2021, we aim to move forward through @UEGJournal presentation at multiple levels. First, we would like to encourage our readers to become familiar with a new journal content with graphical/video abstracts: we believe that this form may capture the audience with the new look of more accessible scientific content. Second, the upcoming release of the #UEGJPodcast series as unique to the brand of our journal. Each podcast episode will highlight one of the most relevant articles published recently. Through audio presentation, authors will have the opportunity to share the message of their papers, such as where the idea came from, how the study was designed, and the clinical implication of the results. Third, involvement of the #UEGAmbassadors will help to enhance the social media presence of the journal. Finally, we will continue the assumptions made so far to encourage our readers/followers to become authors (Figure 1). We hope that the interaction with the UEG Journal and its audience may position authors center in the social media debate, by amplifying their voice and empowering the impact of their findings. ⁴

FIGURE 1.

The role of UEG Journal in empowering the relationship between authors and readers

The year of 2021 will also mean a change in the publisher and in the way UEG Journal papers are accessible and shareable. Our new publisher, Wiley, is one of the largest publishers in the field of medical publication, with 200 years of history, having a portfolio of 36 high‐quality journals in the gastroenterology and hepatology field, of which 7 in the top 25. This change in the publisher will likely represent a step up for the future of UEG Journal, aiming also at increasing our journal impact factor.

Research accessibility drives innovation, more research, and allows clinicians to make more informed decisions, and UEG Journal will now turn into a gold open access model, in which the article is immediately available online (upon acceptance) for all to read, download, and share. UEG Journal papers will be freely and permanently available online upon publication, increasing visibility and allowing a faster impact of published research, improving also public engagement. This transition to gold open access model will also allow funded research to be published in UEG Journal, given that since beginning in 2021, according to “Plan S initiative,” scientific papers that result from research funded by public grants should be published in fully open‐access journals (https://www.coalition‐s.org/).

However, open access carries a moderate Article Publication Charge (APC), but this should not detract authors from submitting to UEG Journal: these changes will improve the visibility of impact of UEG Journal, which will likely have a positive impact on reads, citations and ultimately impact factor. Wiley is also committed to improve the accessibility and visibility of research, and a number of fee exemptions exist. Authors from low‐income countries are granted automatic APC fee waivers under “research4life” program (www.research4life.org/access/eligibility/), and many European Universities and Hospitals are members of National Alliances and cover APCs for authors that publish in Wiley journals, given that Wiley is also an adopter of National Alliance Licenses. This change of publisher will also be a smooth transition for our authors in the submission process that will continue to use ScholarOne platform.

Looking back, we can see that in its ninth year of existence the UEG Journal library is filled with impactful papers and guidelines. ⁵ , ⁶ , ⁷ By presenting experts' position statements, we are up to help establish clinical standards and answer daily practice questions. Also, through Young GI Angle, we try to provide active support for any more lines for the career development of our younger colleagues. ⁸ , ⁹ , ¹⁰

We are crossing into a new year accompanied by Wiley, a brand‐new trainees’ editor team, with goals and eyeing new opportunities to become even better and more accessible to our readers, authors, and followers.

CONFLICTS OF INTEREST

The authors declare that there are no conflict of interest regarding the content of this manuscript.