Goodbye, Bob. Hello, David

Issue: BCMJ, vol. 60, No. 5, June 2018, Page 243 News
By: David R. Richardson, MD

As the saying goes, “time waits for no one,” or something like that. I wish it had waited a little longer as, not without a little sadness, the BCMJ Editorial Board is saying goodbye to Dr Robert Vroom. Dr Vroom has retired and given up his seat at our esteemed table. He will be sorely missed because Dr Vroom knows something about everything and shares this wisdom with grace and humility. We wish him the very best as he enjoys his family and runs the hills of the Sunshine Coast. 

We are excited to welcome Bob’s replacement, Dr David Esler, to our Editorial Board. Dr Esler has practised emergency medicine in and around Vancouver since 1988. He is also a medical reviewer for the College of Physicians and Surgeons of BC. This jazz-playing animal-lover has a special interest in health law, bioethics, risk management, and patient safety. The BCMJ Editorial Board is sure to benefit from Dr Esler’s valuable contributions in the years ahead. 
—DRR

David R. Richardson, MD. Goodbye, Bob. Hello, David. BCMJ, Vol. 60, No. 5, June, 2018, Page(s) 243 - News.


Above is the information needed to cite this article in your paper or presentation. The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) recommends the following citation style, which is the now nearly universally accepted citation style for scientific papers:
Halpern SD, Ubel PA, Caplan AL, Marion DW, Palmer AM, Schiding JK, et al. Solid-organ transplantation in HIV-infected patients. N Engl J Med. 2002;347:284-7.

About the ICMJE and citation styles

The ICMJE is small group of editors of general medical journals who first met informally in Vancouver, British Columbia, in 1978 to establish guidelines for the format of manuscripts submitted to their journals. The group became known as the Vancouver Group. Its requirements for manuscripts, including formats for bibliographic references developed by the U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM), were first published in 1979. The Vancouver Group expanded and evolved into the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), which meets annually. The ICMJE created the Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals to help authors and editors create and distribute accurate, clear, easily accessible reports of biomedical studies.

An alternate version of ICMJE style is to additionally list the month an issue number, but since most journals use continuous pagination, the shorter form provides sufficient information to locate the reference. The NLM now lists all authors.

BCMJ standard citation style is a slight modification of the ICMJE/NLM style, as follows:

  • Only the first three authors are listed, followed by "et al."
  • There is no period after the journal name.
  • Page numbers are not abbreviated.


For more information on the ICMJE Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals, visit www.icmje.org

BCMJ Guidelines for Authors

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