Open Access Newsletter extern 2/2017
 
June 2017

 

Dear Reader,

The quarterly Karger Open Access newsletter provides you with news from the Open Access world and information about Open Access at Karger.

Topics today:

Please visit the Karger Open Access Gateway to find useful information about how and where to publish your research Open Access, as well as an extensive collection of completely free content!

Do you have questions or feedback regarding Open Access? The Karger Open Access team looks forward to hearing from you!

Kind regards,
Beth Bayley for the Karger Open Access team
openaccess@karger.com

P.S. Pro memoria: Have you already set up your profile at Kudos? It takes only a few minutes yet can greatly improve the impact of your article. Three-fourths of the participating authors in a recent survey rated Kudos as a beneficial addition to Karger's author services.

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 News from the Open Access World

The Importance of Ethical Publishers

To appreciate the value of sound scientific publications led by trustworthy editors, consider "Paging Dr. Fraud": The Fake Publishers That Are Ruining Science. Alan Burdick, author of this recent New Yorker article, writes of editors that by "checking the methodology of authors and managing the peer-review process; they are the thin red line between fact and fakery." On the internet, unserious or "fake" editors and unethical, "predatory" publishers have found it far too easy to cross that red line. Fortunately, organizations such as Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA), of which Karger is a member, hold publishers to high standards that may assure researchers of the publishers' quality.


Swiss National Strategy on Open Access

Even though Open Access is a global topic, we would like to take the chance today as a Switzerland-based publishing company to inform you about national initiatives in Switzerland.

The Schweizerische Nationalfonds (SNF) and swissuniversities jointly created and adopted a national Open Access strategy. By 2024, all scholarly publications funded by public money in Switzerland must be freely accessible on the internet. The Swiss strategy is based on Open Access models of other European countries, but allows a longer timeframe for the shift to Open Access. We as a publisher would be very glad to be involved in a continued broad discussion on its implementation with all kinds of stakeholders within the Swiss scientific community.

 

 Open Access at Karger Publishers

New OA Journal Digital Biomarkers

Karger is launching the groundbreaking journal Digital Biomarkers. Digital biomarkers are objective, quantifiable physiological and behavioral data that are collected and measured with digital devices such as portables, wearables, implantables or digestibles. The data collected has the potential to explain, influence and/or predict health-related outcomes in areas from diabetes to asthma to Parkinson's disease. The journal bridges the disciplines of computer science, engineering, biomedicine, regulatory science and informatics.

To get a feel for Digital Biomarkers and its mission, we chatted with Publication Manager Laurenz Baltzer.

Q: What is unique about the concept of Digital Biomarkers?
A: Karger is first among its peers in covering this exciting, emerging field. We are attracting the best and brightest researchers in the field. We are also forming a community from the start with two large US-based societies. News about these co-operations will be announced in the near future.

Q: What makes Digital Biomarkers exciting and essential?
A: I would like to quote Carlos Rodarte, Editorial Board member and Founder and Managing Director of Volar Health, who wrote in his viewpoint article in the first issue of the journal: "Digital biomarkers can improve our understanding of the natural history of disease through more continuous measurement of objective health data. Such an approach enhances the often-limited clinical encounters patients have with their clinicians, which is particularly relevant in diseases where symptom presence and severity is more variable than initially expected or diseases that align to measures captured through current devices, such as mobility."
"Pharma is exploring pilots and strategic initiatives across a number of different therapeutic areas, with a range of partners and devices. In some cases pilots are meant to test the feasibility of a research process involving wearables, in others the focus is to embark on large, multi-year studies to help shape our knowledge of disease progression."
The cross-disciplinary development with computer science and bioinformatics is also exciting.

Please read also the initial editorial by Editor-in-Chief E. Ray Dorsey and look out for upcoming insightful articles, including an interview with Digital Biomarkers Advisory Board member William Marks, Head of Clinical Neurology for Verily Life Sciences (an Alphabet company, formerly Google Life Sciences).

There is currently no fee for submitting or publishing in Digital Biomarkers.


Write Like a Pro: Get Your Papers Published

Although most biomedical scientists did not enter the world of clinical research out of a desire to write, publishing their findings and results so the scientific community can read about them is important.

Paul Lavender, a Publication Manager at Karger and former medical writer and editor, summarized some important things to remember. Here's an outline of the key points:

  1. Do good research. But is it really that simple?
  2. Have a target journal before you write despite the temptation of a one-size-fits-all solution.
  3. Consider the impact factor (IF) of a journal, but be careful, there's a catch!
  4. There are established and recognized checklists - use them before you start writing.
  5. Finally, don't try to be too clever.

Find out what's behind these key points on the Biomedicine Hub website.


An Article Making an Impact

The article 'Cannabis Extract Treatment for Terminal Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia with a Philadelphia Chromosome Mutation' from Case Reports in Oncology continues to draw much interest, as shown by its Altmetric Attention Score. Altmetric uses factors such as shares and mentions to measure the online impact that articles have on researchers, policy makers, the public, and other readers. This article is in the top 5% of Altmetric-scored research output, with mentions by 296 Twitter users and 397 Facebook users, as well as 64 posts on the academic social network Mendeley. We invite you to read the article to see why it is having such an impact.


Top Ten Open Access Articles April to June 2017

Have a look at the most-read Karger Open Access articles:

Most Important Chronic Complications of Arteriovenous Fistulas for Hemodialysis
Med Princ Pract 2013;22:220–228

Dysmetabolic Hyperferritinemia: All Iron Overload Is Not Hemochromatosis
Case Rep Gastroenterol 2015;9:7–14

An Encapsulated Fruit and Vegetable Juice Concentrate Increases Skin Microcirculation in Healthy Women
Skin Pharmacol Physiol 2012;25:2–8

European Guidelines for Obesity Management in Adults
Obes Facts 2015;8:402–424

Sonographic Assessment of Renal Size in Healthy Adults
Med Princ Pract 2014;23:432–436

Eosinophilic Gastroenteritis: Review of a Rare and Treatable Disease of the Gastrointestinal Tract
Case Rep Gastroenterol 2013;7:293–298

The WHO-5 Well-Being Index: A Systematic Review of the Literature
Psychother Psychosom 2015;84:167–176

Association of Adherence to a Healthy Diet with Cognitive Decline in European and American Older Adults: A Meta-Analysis within the CHANCES Consortium
Dement Geriatr Cogn Disord 2017;43:215–227

Amyloid-Beta: A Crucial Factor in Alzheimer's Disease
Med Princ Pract 2015;24:1–10

Mechanisms by Which Dehydration May Lead to Chronic Kidney Disease
Ann Nutr Metab 2015;66(suppl 3):10–13


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