To The Editor:
I was quite surprised to find an article such as "Catastrophic
Complications of Minimally Invasive Hip Surgery. A Series of Three
Cases" (2005;87:711-4), by
Fehring and Mason, receiving such attention from The Journal's
editorial staff as to find its way to being the second article in the April
issue.
While the three reported cases are indeed catastrophic complications, there
is no basis on which to consider this information. I might assume that the
center from which these cases were reported receives a large number of
"catastrophic" referrals. What percentage of their overall
"catastrophes" do these cases represent? Or do they not see
complications from standard incision surgery?
Albeit lacking in scientific value, the article does have merit. The
Journal's decision to give the article second billing, following an
article with top billing shedding poor light on minimally invasive hip
surgery, demonstrates to me that the editorial staff has bias against
minimally invasive hip surgery.
This article belonged, at best, in the case report section. The layout of
the April issue undermines the credibility of your publication and
demonstrates an agenda on the part of the editorial staff.
Your letter raises some important points with regard to the manuscript
review, manuscript selection, and editorial practices of The Journal.
The process necessarily begins with manuscripts, the subject matter of which
is determined by our authors. With the help of a large team of volunteer
reviewers and an expert editorial board, I select the articles to be
published, and my sole criterion is that they will be of benefit to
orthopaedic patients and/or the orthopaedic community. The positioning of
articles within The Journal is determined by me and is largely based
on the desire to deliver a relevant and useful issue each month to our
readers.
Because of the incredible enthusiasm for minimally invasive surgery of the
hip, we anticipated that we would receive objective, scientifically conducted
studies evaluating this new procedure. Unfortunately, few manuscripts have
been forthcoming. With regard to the two articles published in the April
issue, my reviewers and deputy editors thought that both convey an important
message for our readers; thus, they were selected for publication. Because of
the popular nature of the subject, I chose to publish them back to back and to
tie them directly to the editorial by Dr. Berry, which clearly places both
articles in clinical context.
The Journal eagerly awaits the submission of objective
confirmation of the benefits of minimally invasive total hip arthroplasty.
Such a report would be of great benefit to the orthopaedic community and our
patients, and it certainly would be published.
The layout of every issue of The Journal does reflect my bias. I
hope that this bias is not in favor of, or in opposition to, any particular
procedure but rather favors quality care for our patients because that is my
true agenda as Editor.