Introduction to a Novel End-of-the-Year Special Issue of Surgeries

• Dear readers, authors, reviewers, and editors of Surgeries,

Three years ago, we started a novel open access journal with the intention of providing a highly accessible platform to anyone interested in the field of surgery. To claim that Surgeries has already established such a platform would, at this point, have been rather premature. However, as we approach the end of 2023, we have published over 150 papers contributed by 816 authors from 42 different countries. We are proud to observe that some of our papers have been cited more than 10 times, have had more than 12,000 views, or have been downloaded almost 1500 times [1,2,3].

However, even more importantly than merely counting numbers, we are glad to see that the range of topics explored in our articles has started to reflect the wide diversity and variation covered by the field of surgery, from basic science to descriptions of technical procedures. This is reflected in the plethora of article types: in 2022, we published our first ‘Hypothesis’, Communication’, Protocol’, and ‘Brief Report’, and this year, we have welcomed the first ‘Technical Note’, ‘Opinion’, and ‘Conference Report’. Submissions of these types of publications indicate that Surgeries has actually become a platform rather than simply a journal. We offer special thanks to our editorial board members who have introduced Special Issues on topics deserving extra attention.

In this December issue, we are pleased to introduce a novel Special Issue with the intention of offering the floor to our colleagues from the surgical field to share their less scientific and/or medical writing efforts with their peers. With this end-of-year Special Issue, starting in 2024, we hope to establish a tradition in line with the BMJ Christmas issue established in 1982 [4]. We have found two excellent Guest Editors willing to take the lead on a unique end-of-year Special Issue. The Editorial in this December issue is an example of an ‘Essay’ [5], but all reports or other article types with a surgical reflection and/or an end-of-year spirit will be considered and published following the regular peer review process. Other journals have, incidentally, issued related articles as well [6,7,8,9], but we hope to establish an annual tradition focused on all end-of-year subjects that are of interest to the Surgeries audience.

The Surgeries editorial team thank all our contributors and readers and wish all a prosperous and healthy 2024.

Cornelis F.M. Sier, Editor in Chief, Surgeries