How long have you been Editor-in-Chief of The Bone & Joint Journal

I have been Editor-in-Chief since spring 2013.

I first became involved with The Bone & Joint Journal as a young aspiring author when I started to submit papers as a trainee and was always delighted to get published in the best orthopaedic journal. I then had the good fortune to be selected as a reviewer by the Editors and Board at the time and really looked forward to receiving a big brown envelope we received whenever a review was commissioned. I really enjoyed having that special access to new work and to being able to look at it and give my perspective. I thoroughly enjoyed doing that and learnt from it for a number of years.

I was shocked when I was invited to join the Editorial Board. It was inspiring to walk into a room full of the key opinion leaders in British orthopaedics. It has become a key part of my life ever since.

The role of Editor-in-Chief has been one of the privileges of my career. The opportunity to lead the direction and strategy and to help define the content of the best journal in orthopaedics is an incredible one. It is remarkable how the passion that I have for the Journal is shared by the publishing team and by colleagues on the Board. Together we have a tremendous opportunity to drive forward the standards and quality of research, publishing and dissemination in trauma and orthopaedics and ultimately to improve practice and outcomes for our patients.

There are many challenges in my role as Editor-in-Chief. The most challenging include dealing with unhappy authors whose work unfortunately is not of the quality or of enough importance to publish. The other is dealing with tricky situations such as research fraud, dual publication, salami slicing and plagiarism. It is always horrific to see careers derailed by dishonesty.

I would advise anyone interested in The Bone & Joint Journal to put their hand up, to attend one of our reviewer courses, to meet us at one of the frequent meetings where we present and to volunteer to be involved as a reviewer, as a re-writer, or in any other capacity where they have the skills. There is a fantastic group of people at the core of the Journal and they will have a wonderful time contributing.