Well, after 15-plus months, I can officially say that I have authored an article for a journal.  I can also say that this was a very L-O-N-G process, fraught with a bit of angst, requiring a lot of patience (probably more on the editorial group’s end than mine), and filled with surprises along the way.  For anyone even thinking of embarking on this adventure, let me share some of the process with you...for kicks-and-giggles...so that you have a smidgeon of an idea what you might face.

Last spring, I was referred by a friend to a group of editors for a publishing group to writing an article on Bacterial Conjunctivitis.  He knew that my husband was an optometrist and thought that I’d be interested in the idea.  “Sure,” I said.  Blindly, I must add.  I knew that I liked to write papers and do research.  (Egads, what is WRONG with me?!?!  Didn’t I have enough of this in graduate school?) He knew my blogging work already.  I agreed to a phone conference with some of the folks in the publishing group.

They made it extremely easy.  They presented their idea:  write a paper, based on an outline they already had, on bacterial conjunctivitis and treatment.  They would send me 70-some journal articles on a CD to review, and “all” I had to do was write the paper.  The editorial group targeted a particular journal (which I will NOT name) for submission, so they had the hard part of formatting it to their particular guidelines.

Sounds easy, right?

Right.  Sure.  No problemo.

So...I dove into the project with gusto.  I read the articles...and re-read them.  I looked at the outline...then scratched my head.  There were some missing pieces, I thought.  They have information about the types of infections and treatment, but not how to ASSESS or differentiate the types of conjunctivitis.  Personally, when I read articles written by others, I want the WHOLE picture, from soup-to-nuts...not just part of it.

So we had our first of many phone conferences with the “powers that be.” I shared my thoughts.

“Doesn’t it make sense, if we’re writing an article about treating bacterial conjunctivitis, that we need to show HOW to assess it in the first place?” I queried.

Some mumbling on the other end of the phone took place, but they agreed with me.  I added whole sections to the paper, then kept going with the original outline.  Ultimately I battled the project and had multiple pages finished by the end of a weekend.

Then I revised it.  Again.  And again.  Finally, I emailed it to the editorial group at the end of June, 2010, one week ahead of my personal deadline.  Then, the waiting began.  Thus began the first of multiple revisions.

At the end of October, the first revision came through.  I must admit, although the initial sections were mine, the additional words and research detail were not.  It was very good, but I recall thinking, “this isn’t MY work.  It was TOO technical with all of the gobbley-gook research “mumbo-jumbo.” I knew that it was excellent, but I never added the amount of research detail in any paper I ever wrote.  APA format and my professors’ words of “cut-to-the-chase” kept haunting me.  I know when I read certain papers with the research details droning on-and-on, my eyes glaze over.  I admit...I will look at the details for awhile, then my eyes glass over and I find the summed up details at the end.

I also learned along the way that the project was funded by a particular pharmaceutical/medical device company, and I did NOT want to appear that my paper was skewed toward their product in any way.  I found it interesting that this was not shared with me initially, but by the tone of the initial articles and outline, it was rather easy to surmise.  Nonetheless, I felt that the final draft offered a fair balance of information.

Needless to say, while the final draft was excellent, it didn’t feel like MY type of paper.  Quite frankly, I was a bit disappointed.  However, I knew that the editorial team had worked so hard on it, and it WAS good...so I gave my final approval.

It was submitted to the aforementioned journal for review in April, 2011...almost 10 months after my finished first draft.

I received my rejection letter ONE day later.  The reasons for rejection:

(1) It had a “similarity index” that was too high – it was too similar to other articles written by others...even if NONE of them were in nursing or “traditional” medicine.  In fact, in the most similar article written in the journal – “Optometry and Vision Science” – 9% of the words were similar.  I’m guessing that we all read that one, ‘eh?  (smile) Of course, the aforementioned article came out 11/2010...months after my first final draft was finished, too.  The next several articles that were “close” were all from ophthalmology and optometry journals as well – they had a similarity index of 1%. 
(2) The text was not readable for the reviewers when converted to HTML format.  (I have no idea...this was done by the editorial team, supposedly to help the reviewers.) 
(3) There was author information in the main body of the text, along with extraneous information about target journal that should have been removed by whomever formatted the paper (again...not sure what that meant, as my information wasn’t even listed in the main body) 
(4) The references were not in APA 6th ed. format

I emailed the editorial team with the news.  Suffice it to say, they were stunned.  They had reviewed the publishing guidelines WELL in advance, so this was a huge blow to them, given their massive efforts in the preceding months.  They told me they would review things and be in touch.

Weeks went by.  I was disappointed in the email I had received, but only because I sensed that the editorial team was crushed.  This journal had actually not been my first choice.  So I waited.  Finally, I emailed my contact person to ask what was going on.

The response I got was, “would you consider submitting the article to Clinical Advisor?  We have to reformat the article to cut it to 3000 words, but we think it would be a good fit.”

I was excited.  Now THAT was a journal I read monthly...both in-print and online.  Yes, I responded.  Please...do what you need to do.

Fast forward a few months...and the final copy was sent to me.  Alas...it was MY article again.  Oh, the occasional research tidbit was expanded, but I looked at the copy with a sense of pride-and-joy.  THIS was something I was happy to have my name on as the author.

Now...all we needed to do was submit it and hope it was accepted.

This time, I submitted the article to the editor personally.  He responded quickly, saying it was interesting and he would review it.  After almost five weeks, he sent an email with a question about how something was phrased.  The next thing I knew, it went to print.  Complete with icky photos (not mine, thank you) for dramatic effect, and CME credits to boot.

So in retrospect, my part in the journey really started and ended awhile ago, other than the editorial review aspect.  However, this IS my article again.  I get nothing but the the kudos of authoring an article on my resume...and new respect about how the journalistic process really works.

Kim

RECOMMEND THIS ARTICLE

You must be logged in
to recommend articles

Average (Not Rated)

» Recommended Articles