Building a Vision

It is a great privilege to be invited to serve as Associate Editor at Paediatric and Perinatal Epidemiology (PPE), a journal that I esteem highly for reasons that form the foundation for my vision and aims. I admire PPE because it promotes rigorous methodology and highquality research, encourages debates and offers a broad comparative international scope. PPE provides a unique forum for rigorous dialogue about subjects in perinatal and paediatric epidemiology. I value the many manuscripts devoted to methods as well as the debates engendered by the presentation of multiple perspectives on unsettled scientific questions. The quality of the research is high; it will come as no surprise to the journal’s readers that roughly one in five submitted manuscripts is accepted. My first aim is thus to follow in the successful footsteps of my predecessors by working with the journal’s excellent network of reviewers to maintain the high standards of PPE’s content and to improve it further. The journal’s focus fosters links between ideas and people and reinforces the community of researchers committed to improving maternal and child health. This community spirit is yet another reason that PPE stands out. This spirit was ignited at the journal’s inception 25 years ago and nourished by the energy of its founding editor, Jean Golding, and her editorial team. My second aim is thus to preserve and reinforce these relationships. Given this, I take note of Jean Golding’s lament in her May 2012 editorial about the disappearance of paper journals and the consequences of this decline on the cross-fertilisation of ideas that occurs from browsing through an issue from beginning to end. The journal’s structured presentation of articles by theme and Cande Ananth’s proposals to increase invited commentaries respond in part to this concern. Facilitating the serendipitous meeting of minds in an electronic world is an important challenge for the future. The journal’s international identity is one more reason why I value PPE. The anchorage of PPE in Europe, the Americas and across the remaining continents is quickly evinced from a review of PPE’s editorial board. This reason alone has great appeal to me as an American who made my home in France. A quick survey of the journal’s recent issues illustrates its international scope; in March and May contributions came from Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden, Taiwan, the US and the UK. The experiences of pregnancy, childbirth and childhood are highly socially and culturally patterned and much can be learned by practising epidemiology in a cross-national context. It is an exciting time for comparative international research as countries strengthen their data capacities (through reinforced national birth registers and hospital databases and establishment of new birth cohorts) and as more international collaborations from around specific research questions. PPE is an excellent forum for the results emerging from these initiatives. In addition to soliciting and encouraging manuscript submission in this area, I aim to expand the geographical reach of PPE’s pool of authors, reviewers and of its readers. These aims originate from my own experiences with the journal and from my discussions with Cande Ananth, our new Editor-in-Chief. I am looking forward to learning from his vision for the journal (and his impressive managerial skills) as well as from the expertise of our new editorial team. I hope also to establish an active dialogue with you – readers, reviewers and contributors – in order to expand these aims to integrate what you value most about PPE. Correspondence: Jennifer Zeitlin, U953, Epidemiological Research Unit on Perinatal Health and Women’s and Children’s Health INSERM, 53 avenue de l’Observatoire, 75014 Paris, France. E-mail: jennifer.zeitlin@inserm.fr bs_bs_banner