The evolving climate of medical publishing has introduced new challenges for The Journal of Laryngology & Otology in 2024, not least of which has been a cyber security problem at Cambridge University Press, from which they are thankfully emerging. The functioning day to day of the journal is dependent on the work of our reviewers and assistant editors. They are always busy clinicians and/or researchers, with many commitments, including royal college work, local administration and administrating ENT professional bodies. This work for The Journal is conducted in very precious ‘premium time’. We must also mention the tireless work by our managing editor, company secretary, senior editors and trustees.
Highlights of 2024 have been the publication online of updated guidelines for head and neck surgery topics, and similarly for vestibular medicine, along with an innovation linking them with patient-focussed guidelines. This has been with the collaboration and authorisation of relevant professional bodies and the guideline editors are to be congratulated.
In addition to reviewing articles, our team have been involved in setting up operative video recordings in their hospitals, which involves careful planning and execution. We are very grateful to Miss Pei-Pei Cheang in Tunbridge Wells and her theatre team for their work on pinnaplasty surgery videos, which is a common topic in postgraduate ENT examinations, yet trainees have limited exposure to the operation in National Health Service theatres. We hope that these videos will be enjoyed by trainees and established clinicians alike. Further videos will be added to the collection each year, focusing on common ENT procedures such as tonsillectomy, adenoidectomy and ventilation tube insertion. We are grateful to Mrs Storz and Ben Pattinson from Storz UK for providing the sponsorship which has helped to fund these very valuable educational resources.
Much of our work is conducted by our small group of senior editors, assistant editors, emeritus editors and international liaison editors, who are listed in the journal's flyleaf and online. Patrick Bradley has continued in 2024 to help us from retirement with workflow in head and neck, as he did in 2023. We also benefit from a pool of reviewers who contribute considerably to our work, with several recruited in the past year.
We would like to formally thank our reviewers, and name them below:
Brian Bingham
Sumrit Bola
Patrick Bradley
Pei-Pei Cheang
Marianne Elloy
Ali Fahmy
Richard Green
Andrew Harris
Simon Howe
Jonathan Hughes
Hiro Ishii
David Morris
Peter Monksfield
Neil Sharma
Joel Smith
Kate Stephenson
Jenny Walton
Stuart Winter
