In approaching my new role as coeditor of the Canadian Journal of Surgery, I wish to express my sincere thanks to those who supported my appointment to such a privileged position. I am looking forward to my new duties with great enthusiasm.
Fourteen years has elapsed since I published my first scientific communication in the Journal. My mentors had always taught me that in submitting a manuscript for publication I should seek the best peer review process possible. There was little doubt that I was rewarded with one of the most stringent peer reviews that I have ever received! I can recall subsequent discussions about the merit of publication leading to my own career advancement and citing its review by the Journal. Thus, the Journal has been and continues to aim for the highest possible quality of scholarship in disseminating new knowledge in clinical and basic science research.
I look forward to holding up the fine tradition established by the Journal’s editorial staff and expanding a role as an authoritative voice for developments in Canadian surgical practice and science. To illustrate some of the forthcoming challenges, I summarize some key points discussed this week among the Chairs of the Canadian University Departments of Surgery that affect our academic and our greater communities in surgery. The departmental leadership within our country is on the cusp of transition in that fully one-half of the departments are undergoing a search for new leadership or have recently appointed new leaders (me included).
Effective recruitment to Canadian academic and community surgery must be maintained. Key questions were posed about the needs for surgical recruitment, key areas of unmet needs and the relation of surgical to nonsurgical programs of recruitment. In this, the “social accountability” toward sustaining viable scholarship and practice in surgery must be vigorously maintained.
New challenges in educating greater numbers of undergraduate and postgraduate surgical trainees lie ahead. These range from augmenting the numbers of trainees to full-scale expansion of new medical programs in distributed (community) sites. The new activity will pose major questions with respect to sustaining the quality of surgical education and corresponding audit of effective surgical teaching. The culture must be ingrained with rapid health reform that has been suggested by the recent Romanow Report.
Relationships between surgical communities across Canada must be sustained as well as relationships with our surgical colleagues internationally. The advance of surgical innovation within our country must be nurtured and supported. We are already witnessing collaboration among partners in health regions, provincial ministries and surgical practitioners on a scale never previously observed; for example, in networks that seek to improve access to surgical care through definitive wait list management projects. New interaction with surgical societies on our continent and internationally needs to be fostered.
Particularly important in rapidly evolving surgical practice and scholarship is the transition to new leaders in Canadian surgery. With the change in our academic departments as an example, it is essential that we prepare and mentor our successors so that they can be as effective as possible in leading surgical programs in the future.
In summary, these are a few of the pressing issues that await Canadian surgical specialists and their leaders. I look forward to a new role with colleagues on the editorial staff of CJS to ensure that the Journal remains in the vanguard to advance new knowledge in surgical care. My aspiration is to sustain the quality of excellence in peer review that the Journal has benchmarked so well.