Journal Relaunch

It is a deep honor to serve as the next Editor-in-Chief of WORLD NEUROSURGERY: X. Until now, Dr. Ed Benzel has been serving as Editor-in-Chief of both WORLD NEUROSURGERY and its open access companion journal, WORLD NEUROSURGERY: X. By splitting the editorship, we allow WORLD NEUROSURGERY: X to grow alongside, but independent of, WORLD NEUROSURGERY, allowing for seamless article transfer without any fear of conflict of interest. With a separate editor, but residing within the WORLD NEUROSURGERY family of journals, WORLD NEUROSURGERY: X enjoys the best of both worlds: we are able to adopt the logistics familiar to WORLD NEUROSURGERY authors and readers while exploring new ways to grow WORLD NEUROSURGERY: X and develop our own signature.

One of the primary differences between the 2 journals is that WORLD NEUROSURGERY: X is completely open access. This allows for vast readership and compliance with H2020 requirements.¹ WORLD NEUROSURGERY: X remains peer-reviewed, with many of the same high-quality reviewers from the international neurosurgery community that you have come to expect from WORLD NEUROSURGERY. Already indexed within Scopus, Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), and PubMed Central, we anticipate applying for an impact factor for WORLD NEUROSURGERY: X within the next 2 years.

We are still in the brainstorming phase of how to expand and create an identity for WORLD NEUROSURGERY: X. It is important to me that we not only honor our roots, but also forge our own path. For now, our aims and scope will remain similar to WORLD NEUROSURGERY, with an additional focus on quality improvement and patient safety, innovation, education, and leadership. While this type of research might not cross our desks often, it exists. I hope to tap into data and techniques on error elimination and managing high-performance teams from our collaborators in the social sciences as we seek to optimize all aspects of our daily medical practice.

Look for additional interaction with WORLD NEUROSURGERY: X as we develop our own social media presence. We want to know what serves you best from content to cover art, and we want to give you quick access to some of the impressive work coming out each quarter.

I feel WORLD NEUROSURGERY: X is much like our new resident graduates; we will start out doing a lot of things the way our mentors taught us, but as time goes on, we’ll work to integrate ways of our own. At any moment, I aim for both our origin and our individuality to be clear. If WORLD NEUROSURGERY: X can replicate anything close to the growth Dr. Benzel has brought to WORLD NEUROSURGERY over the last 7 years, we all stand to benefit from additional vetted outlets for open access research. I’m so grateful for the chance to lead the relaunch of WORLD NEUROSURGERY: X, and I look forward to serving you.