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| EDITORIAL |
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| Year : 2021 | Volume
: 1
| Issue : 1 | Page : 1 |
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The story is the thing -
The birth of Indian Journal of Ophthalmology Case Reports
Santosh G Honavar
Editor, Indian Journal of Ophthalmology Case Reports, Centre for Sight, Road No 2, Banjara Hills, Hyderabad, Telangana, India
| Date of Web Publication | 31-Dec-2020 |
Correspondence Address:
Dr. Santosh G Honavar
Editor, Indian Journal of Ophthalmology Case Reports, Centre for Sight, Road No 2, Banjara Hills, Hyderabad, Telangana
India
 Source of Support: None, Conflict of Interest: None
DOI: 10.4103/ijo.IJO_3810_20
How to cite this article:
Honavar SG. The story is the thing -
The birth of Indian Journal of Ophthalmology Case Reports. Indian J Ophthalmol Case Rep 2021;1:1 |
"The delight of opening a new pursuit, or a new course of reading, imparts the vivacity and novelty of youth even to old age." - Isaac D'Israeli
It is with great pleasure that I present to you the inaugural issue of the Indian Journal of Ophthalmology Case Reports (IJOCR). The All India Ophthalmological Society (AIOS) was established in 1930. Although the thought process for a scientific journal began in 1940, it took over a decade to formally launch the Indian Journal of Ophthalmology (IJO) in 1953 and another four decades for it to stabilize. IJO is one of the oldest medical journals in India and is currently in its sixty-ninth year of publication. [1] The idea of IJOCR as a dedicated journal for brief scientific communications was conceived just about a year ago, and it is already a reality. The inaugural issue carries a wealth of 80 brief reports from six countries. IJOCR is designed as a quarterly hybrid journal, online with open access and limited print copies. Let us enthusiastically celebrate the birth of a new child in the AIOS family after 68 years and nurture its growth.
"There are two lasting bequests we can give our children. One is roots. The other is wings."- Hodding Carter Jr.
Being a companion journal of an already mature publication, IJOCR is privileged to inherit and benefit from the deep roots and the legacy of AIOS and IJO - the collective wisdom of 23000+ AIOS members, spirited leadership of the AIOS and the talented IJO editorial board, and the robust peer-review process. A broad base of national and international authors, and support from Wolters Kluwer Medknow, one of the largest international publishers of medical journals, give it the vital wings. Indulgent readers, of course, remain the wind beneath the wings.
| Why Case Reports? | |  |
"The short story should be an explosion of the truth." - William Trevor
Case reports have been placed in the lowest rung in the hierarchy of evidence-based medicine. However, they are often the first line of evidence, where it all begins. [2] Although detecting novelties, generating hypotheses, pharmacovigilance, high applicability when other research designs are not possible, fostering in-depth understanding, and educational value are the undeniable merits of case reports, obvious limitations are the lack of ability to generalize or establish a cause-effect relationship, the danger of over-interpretation, publication bias, and focus on quirk and the unusual. [3] Vandenbroucke's iconic editorial in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine points out that "Hierarchy, with the randomized trial on top, holds for a single purpose - the evaluation of the medical interventions with wide applicability in which there is uncertainty about a benefit that is not striking. Case reports and case series have other roles that answer basic needs in medicine." [2] One of the basic needs of medicine is peer-to-peer teaching. Clinicians learn from stories, anecdotes, and patient-based experiences. Case reports remain a vital and democratic peer-to-peer form of horizontal medical communication - reporting on the fly, and fixing mistakes along the way, exactly as it happens in real-life situations. Case reports are considered indispensable for the ability to document novelties, thereby generating new scientific hypotheses. [4] They encourage clinicians to break out of the regulatory boxes and look further than guidelines to use their clinical experience and critical faculties and develop their sleuthing skills. [5]
The birth of IJOCR represents an exciting development in the field of Indian ophthalmology. It envisages keeping alive the importance of case reports by providing a clear space for agenda-setting ophthalmic narratives. Ophthalmologists being no less than artisans, the good craft must go hand in hand with good science. IJOCR offers a unique repository for the pearls of wisdom arising out of astute clinical observations, new insights provided by clinical investigations and imaging, innovations by the surgeons, and the hindsight of clinicians and allied specialists in the form of case reports, photo essays, ophthalmic images, surgical pearls, and clinical-radiological, pathological, and microbiological correlations. We look forward to your indulgence - your writing for IJOCR, reading it, and commenting on its publications. We are confident that IJOCR will be able to continue the long tradition of AIOS and IJO in fostering science and learning and help shake-awaken the Sherlock Holmes within each of us.
"You know my method. It is founded upon the observation of trifles." - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in The Bascombe Valley Mystery
| References | | |
| 1. | Honavar SG. Indian Journal of Ophthalmology--The journey so far. Indian J Ophthalmol 2019;67:317-20.  [ PUBMED] [Full text] |
| 2. | Vandenbroucke JP. In defense of case reports and case series. Ann Intern Med 2001;134:330-4. |
| 3. | Nissen T, Wynn R. The clinical case report: A review of its merits and limitations. BMC Res Notes 2014;7:264. |
| 4. | Nissen T, Wynn R. The recent history of the clinical case report: A narrative review. JRSM Short Rep 2012;3:87. |
| 5. | Thornton H. Case reports: "Explaining the phenomena of clinical experience" "A cornerstone of medical progress". Int J Surg 2010;8:333-5. |
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