key: cord-0707064-ym1w52y5 authors: Erdinest, Nir; Noyman, Dror Ben Ephraim; London, Naomi; Naroo, Shehzad A. title: Increased submissions to ophthalmology scientific journals during the COVID-19 pandemic date: 2022-04-30 journal: Cont Lens Anterior Eye DOI: 10.1016/j.clae.2022.101701 sha: fc5071469d10c38d17bef9acf69390017d98798f doc_id: 707064 cord_uid: ym1w52y5 nan Increased submissions to ophthalmology scientific journals during the COVID-19 pandemic The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic began at the end of 2019 and quickly became a global issue affecting most countries in early 2020. Lockdowns were implemented by most countries and continued in various forms for around two years. These unprecedented restrictions were elevated and reduced with the pandemic waves within each geographical area, causing many people to stay at home, sometimes for considerably extended periods. Education was often performed on online platforms, and, where possible, people would work from home [1] . For clinical research, this meant that investigations involving human subjects were postponed [1, 3] . The extensive disruption has led to incalculable setbacks for investigators, many affecting career advancement. These include cancellations of long-running experiments, the loss of opportunities to collect data, and lack of access to specialized instrumentation [1, 4] . In many cases, researchers altered their types of study as this presented a unique opportunity to focus on either existing data sets or undeveloped manuscripts. Research administration had been equally affected as they were inundated with urgent requests for approvals for COVID-19 related studies [2] . Many journals expediated submissions related to COVID19 and publishers waived the 'open access' fee for COVID-related papers to ensure good quality and evidence-based information was available for the basis of changes that were being implemented by authorities. Initially there was some concern over contact lens use during the pandemic and whether the risk of adverse events increased. An important paper looking at this and dispelling some of the myth and providing an evidence base was published in CLAE [5] . This paper was reviewed, revised and accepted for publication within 3 days and was online shortly afterwards so that practitioners had a reliable source of information. Anecdotally, many journal editors commented on the unprecedented increased number of submissions and publications to their journals. That was certainly true at CLAE, and we wanted to know if this was the case in other ophthalmic journals. We contacted the Editors of 100 ophthalmic scientific journals and asked them about the number of submissions during the two years of the COVID-19 pandemic compared to the period two years prior. Thirteen journal editors responded, and the information is summarised below (the journals are not named as this information is -2019 490 429 30 6 3 6 16 34 2020-2021 769 665 27 11 6 19 41 2 2018-2019 150 147 1 2 19 2020-2021 219 214 1 4 3 2018-2019 2631 1658 64 6 591 128 145 33 2020-2021 3198 1899 92 12 934 101 146 4 2018-2019 1508 144 67 23 11 2020-2021 1881 204 94 17 5 2018-2019 2495 2013 161 37 58 188 38 160 2020-2021 3982 3097 247 74 99 325 129 6 2018-2019 1232 14 2020-2021 1361 7 2018-2019 631 355 12 211 8 12 2020-2021 895 489 17 316 10 8 2018-2019 868 700 14 97 34 23 3 2020-2021 1014 804 36 122 23 29 9 2018 considered sensitive for publishers). Most of the journals were able to provide information as to the type of submissions (Full articles, Reviews, Editorials, Case reports, Letters etc.), although three did not provide this breakdown.During two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, the average number of submissions increased by 42% compared to the two years prior, and all types of papers showed more submissions. However, total journal publications did not and cannot increase to that magnitude, as individual journals have page count restrictions. For CLAE, the rejection rate over the pandemic era increased nearly 10% compared to the prepandemic era. It would be incorrect to assume that the quality of research was affected as data may have been available pre-pandemic, and journals would be applying the same editorial rigour as they would do usually. The 87% increase in invited editorials is interesting as it actually represents more of a change in the journal. Some journals may have invited editorials related to the pandemic; in CLAE there were 3 editorials directly related to contact lens practice during the pandemic [6] [7] [8] . Review submissions increased by 77% across all journals. Perhaps this is another indication that it was a time to reflect, organise, and more deeply comprehend accumulated knowledge or reveals a change in the way that research was being conducted. Letters are communications by readers inspired by full articles in that journal or a commentary on a clinical finding. We can only speculate as to the cause of the 46% increase in this type of submission, but at CLAE, letters related to clinical observations related to COVID-19 were published and in fact were given publication priority over some other papers because they provided useful and important information to the profession [9] [10] [11] [12] . As there was an influx of submissions, there was also a need for more reviewers so that editors could accept manuscripts appropriately and publish them in a timely manner [13] . However, the time frame from submission to publication was lengthened. We also found at CLAE that the increase of new submissions has led to a backlog of papers waiting to be published. Though intuitively, most stages of a publishing platform in a global online environment can be performed remotely, surrounding circumstances such as illness or additional responsibilities may have influenced reviewers' schedules and efficiency. Although the pandemic caused drastic changes in both the clinical and academic realms, the ophthalmic community showed strength and commitment, applying their time and energy to investigational activity and advancement of knowledge. The significant increase in submissions during the pandemic, yet unrelated directly to COVID-19, shows our colleagues' genuine dedication to the profession. 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