Editor's corner

1. Relocating the editorial office 

I am happy to inform you that we have now successfully moved the entire Sleep Medicineeditorial office from New York City, New York to Edison, New Jersey, USA. Any move of this magnitude invariably creates difficulties. I take this opportunity to thank all of our authors and reviewers for their patience and understanding during this challenging period. The journal is now running smoothly again in our new location at the NJ Neuroscience Institute at JFK Medical Center. Our new editorial assistant, Ms Sara Sowers, has been very efficiently managing the flow of the manuscripts for the journal and has given her best efforts to keep all authors and reviewers satisfactorily informed of new contact information and other changes.

2. Affiliation of Sleep Medicine and the World Association of Sleep Medicine (WASM) 

By the time this editorial will appear in the September issue of the journal the publisher of Sleep Medicine and both the Chair of the Publication Committee, Dr Birgit Högl, and the President Elect, Dr Markku Partinen, of the WASM, will have signed the final agreement to officially affiliate Sleep Medicine with the WASM. Dr Birgit Högl and the members of this committee have worked tirelessly for months to carefully evaluate and select a journal to affiliate with the WASM, which will cater to the sleep clinicians of the world. This is an exciting venture and one we are hoping will be mutually beneficial both to the journal and to the WASM. The journal will devote regular pages to announce various WASM-related activities.

3. History of Sleep Medicine 

We started this section beginning with the January 2004 issue of the journal. I am now pleased to announce that Dr Roger Broughton, Professor of Neurology at the University of Ottawa, who is an outstanding sleep researcher and has been a contributor in clinical sleep science for the past three decades, has agreed to become the editor of the ‘History of Sleep Medicine’ section. He will organize interesting historical articles to appear regularly in this section.

4. Clinical Cornerstones 

Beginning with the November 2004 issue of the journal, a new section called ‘Clinical Cornerstones’ will be introduced. This section will deal with complex and unusual cases of sleep disorders and will seek comments from readers about these cases. Dr Alon Avidan, section editor for WebWatch, has agreed to become the editor for this new section. Further details will be provided by Dr Avidan in the next issue of the journal.

5. Online submissions 

We are planning to launch web-based submissions and reviews by the end of this year. Details will be provided in the November issue of the journal. This will speed up the publication process considerably.

6. Images in Sleep Medicine 

Our two co-editors, Robert Thomas and Liborio Parrino, of this newly introduced section are planning to publish the first set of images in the November 2004 issue of Sleep Medicine. We encourage all potential authors to submit to one of the co-editors of this section, or to the Editor-in-Chief, high-resolution images (e.g. PSG tracing, actigraphic recording, neuroimaging, etc.) derived from a specific sleep-related clinical situation, accompanied by a brief clinical summary, significance of the finding, and figure legends.

We welcome any suggestions and comments about any of our planned new initiatives or regarding other matters. Our recent move has presented considerable challenges to the editorial office. We once again thank the authors and the reviewers for their patience and understanding. This journal belongs to the authors and to the readers, and we at the editorial office are continually striving to publish the best science in sleep medicine.