Results and Background
Between 1953 and December 2012, ThCVS was issued in 60 volumes and published 5,400 articles altogether. The surgical specialties
covered were cardiac 3,212 (59%), thoracic 1,709 (32%), and others including vascular
479 (9%).
The original publishing frequency of six issues per year was increased to eight in
2006. Additional supplements were introduced over time, either publishing the abstracts
presented at the annual meeting of the German Society for Thoracic and Cardiovascular
Surgery (disregarded here) or dealing with particular topics of interest in full-length
articles (included here).
The journal changed its language of publication to English in 1979, at the same time
taking over its current title. Over 60 years, it has seen five Editors-in-Chief, their
terms of office ranging from 3 (current) to 25 years (founding) (25, 9, 9, 14, 3+
years).
1953
In 1953, Karl Vossschulte, renowned head of surgery at Giessen University, founded
the journal under the name of Thoraxchirurgie together with Thieme Publishers. The subtitle quite impressively read: “Journal for
clinical and operative surgery, pathological physiology, experimental pathology of
the organs of the chest, and for anaesthesiology” (sic). Vossschulte was aware of
the growing importance of thoracic surgery and the many unknowns still connected with
it at that time. In the very first foreword, Rudolf Nissen, one of the pioneers in
this developing specialty, wrote: “However, it would be absurd to see the foundation
of the new journal as a step towards the creation of a specialty of thoracic surgery…
On the contrary, the journal should encourage a general surgeon to take a more active
part in thoracic organ surgery research and practice than has been the case up to
now.”[2] Time would prove him wrong.
The journal, meanwhile, was published six times a year. It is interesting to see that
even in the very first volume, published throughout the year in which the first successful
cardiac operation with a heart–lung machine ever was performed, already 7 of 58 articles
dealt with problems related to the heart. Their titles are listed in [Table 1]. From today's editor's perspective, it is remarkable that four of those have one
author only, and the others two, three, and four, respectively. The articles tend
to be lengthy and comprehensive, missing the rigid structure required today. References
are scarce. Most of the contributions, however, make very good reading, being written
in an illustrative and, in parts, very graphic language.
Table 1
“Cardiac” articles published in Thoraxchirurgie 1953, issue 1
|
Authors
|
Title (translated into English by M.K.H.)
|
Pages
|
|
Krauss H.
|
Narrowing of trachea and esophagus by congenital malformations of the mediastinal
vessels and their treatment
|
25–33
|
|
Wilflingseder P., Halhuber M., Weithaler K.
|
On the treatment of the callous inflammation of pericardium and pleura
|
136–145
|
|
Steinhardt O.
|
Clinical and experimental findings on cardiac arrest
|
222–227
|
|
Hueck O.
|
Congenital aortopulmonary window defect
|
365–372
|
|
Nick J.
|
On the connection of the pulmonary veins into the left atrium
|
387–402
|
|
Rinck H., Venrath H., Valentin H., Schmitz Th.
|
Diffusion disturbances of the lungs from long-standing insufficiency of the left heart
and from mitral stenosis, as well as some remarks on the operative treatment of mitral
valve disease
|
403–410
|
|
Nissen R., Hase O.
|
Mediastinopericarditis externa, caused by paraffin
|
480–488
|
1958
On February 19, 1958, the first cardiac operation with extracorporeal circulation
in Germany was performed by Zenker in Marburg. On October 8, Arne Larsson received
the first fully implantable pacemaker by Senning in Stockholm. In the United States,
the oldest scientific journal covering thoracic surgery, The Journal of Thoracic Surgery, founded by the American Association for Thoracic Surgery in 1931, changed its name
to The Journal of Thoracic and Cardio-vascular Surgery, following the evolution of the specialty.
Thoraxchirurgie also encountered increasing numbers of articles: 26 of 55 articles published in 1958
already dealt with cardiac surgery. A strong focus lay on the technical refinement
of the heart–lung machine.[3]
[4]
[5] In thoracic surgery, chronic empyema and esophageal surgery played an important
role, as well as surgery of intrathoracic goiter and respiratory therapy. Single authorships
still prevailed.
1963
The journal changed its name to Thoraxchirurgie, Vaskuläre Chirurgie. Why the heart was still left out is hard to comprehend in retrospect. Two additional
editors were hired: Hegemann (Erlangen) and Senning (by then in Zurich, Switzerland).
A rudimentary form of instructions for authors was published, encouraging submission
of abstracts in German, English, and French. Thereby, the journal opened itself to
a more international audience.
The first fully “foreign language” articles were soon accepted,[6]
[7] both dealing with esophageal operations, still an essential part of thoracic surgery.
The individual articles, mostly by single authors, had become much shorter, averaging
four to six printed pages. As a result, the number of published articles in 1 year
had increased to 91, 32 of which dealt with cardiac surgery. An early form of review
article (“Übersicht”) appeared, longer by nature and accompanied by an extended reference
list.[8]
1968
In 1965, The Annals of Thoracic Surgery was published for the first time as the journal of the newly founded Society of Thoracic
Surgeons (STS), and by 1967 Barnard's first attempt at heart transplantation as well
as Favaloro's articles on coronary bypass procedures had been published.[9]
[10] The 1968 volume of Thoraxchirurgie, Vaskuläre Chirurgie contained 87 articles, 47 being “cardiac.” Of note is an article by Schiller and
Krepp on experimental myocardial revascularization in dogs,[11] still investigating the potential of indirect angioneogenesis and coming to a negative
result. They discuss, however, the urgent need for a surgical therapy of coronary
heart disease in the absence of a valid causal medical therapy and thus had their
finger at the pulse of time. Other articles deal with congenital as well as valvular
heart disease. In thoracic surgery, esophageal procedures keep being covered widely.
Vascular topics include the (partial) occlusion of the inferior vena cava to prevent
recurrent pulmonary embolism.
1973
In 1971, the German Society for Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery was founded and
Thoraxchirurgie, Vaskuläre Chirurgie became its scientific journal 2 years later, then publishing 88 contributions, 50
of which had a cardiac subject. This new official function increased the political
impact as can be evidenced in the published presidential address of the second annual
meeting of the society. In it, Hans Borst advocated the institutionalization of the
new specialties, contradicting Nissen's opinion from 20 years' earlier: “The children
thoracic, cardiac, and vascular surgery have outgrown the lap of their mother without
her realizing the consequences, as is so often true in life… These our opinions may
be regarded as revolutionary. Myself I consider them not even original, unless one
would view each development initiated in Germany for the first time as new.[12]”
1978
Since 1976, ThCVS was publishing 1 yearly supplement covering the abstracts of the presentations at
the German annual meeting, a feature still valid today. In 1978, Vossschulte handed
over the editor's baton to H.G. Borst in Hannover. By then, the journal had clearly
focused on cardiac surgery, accounting for 53 of 81 articles. Having been trained
in the United States, Borst immediately improved the internationalization of the journal.
He soon achieved acceptance into the Current Contents Clinical Medicine and constant
listing in the Science Citation Index by Thomson Reuters on December 12, 1978. The
journal has retained this status ever since, which nowadays is reflected by the Impact
Factor. With the beginning of 1979, English was made the publication language and
a concise version of instructions for authors, which became mandatory, was published
in the masthead. More international members were included in the editorial board.
Submissions in German and French were still allowed. In case of acceptance, however,
the author was responsible for the translation into English before definitive publication.
Borst also gave the journal its distinctive English name, well recognized until today:
ThCVS. 1979 also saw the first publication of the German society's annual performance statistics
of the preceding year, then covering just half a page including one table.[13]
[14]
1983
By 1983, Borst had been successful in making ThCVS also the official journal of the cardiac surgical societies in Austria and the Netherlands.
The number of articles had grown to 106 with 75 being cardiac. This was in part due
to the publication of the proceedings of an industry-sponsored valve symposium as
a second supplement. But even apart from this extra issue, there was a strong emphasis
on valvular topics this year.[15]
[16]
[17] However, the announcement of the editor's invention of his famous elephant trunk
technique for aortic surgery must not be left unmentioned.[18]
1988
H.G. Borst was one of the godfathers of the European Association for Cardio-Thoracic
Surgery (EACTS) and became the editor of the associated journal, the European Journal of Cardio-Thoracic Surgery (EJCTS), which was first published in July 1987. ThCVS editorial office therefore migrated from Hannover to Homburg/Saar with Kurd Stapenhorst
at the reign. Meanwhile, Great Britain, Spain, and Switzerland had been added to the
international society affiliations. The new editor extended and rephrased the instructions
for authors. Their restraints made the articles even shorter.
1988 marked the 10th anniversary of publishing the German society's cardiac surgical
performance statistics. The importance of this consequent quality control, unique
at that time, featured widely in the journal.[19]
[20]
[21] A whole supplement dealt with a new but eventually erroneous development, almost
forgotten today.[22]
1993
With cardiac surgery celebrating its 40th anniversary, it seems befitting that ThCVS published several outcome-oriented articles on long-term follow-up that year.[23]
[24]
[25]
[26]
[27] It appears that the general interest had moved from the sheer fascination of technical
matters to quality of life issues: from the surgeon's to the patient's perspective
rather. In thoracic surgery, however, further refinement of operative techniques prevailed
with the growing importance of thoracoscopic procedures. A comprehensive editorial
was written by Toomes introducing three related original articles.[28]
1998
In 1996, W.P. Klövekorn, Bad Nauheim, had taken over as Editor-in-Chief from K Stapenhorst,
and by 1998 the journal's support of societies now listed Germany, the Netherlands,
Great Britain, Spain, Switzerland, and Turkey. The new editor emphasized his interest
in basic science in the journal, publishing a second supplement covering the “Symposium
on Myocardial Protection: Physiological Principles - Established Techniques - New
Strategies,” which had been organized in Cologne by E.R. de Vivie and U. Mehlhorn.
K.H. Leitz even edited a third (German language) supplement on “rationing in medicine,”
the summary of a satellite symposium in conjunction with the annual meeting of the
German society in Dresden that year. This boosted the whole volume to 106 articles,
76 dealing with a “cardiac” subject.
2003
To introduce the 50th anniversary of ThCVS, the historical foreword by Nissen was translated into English and republished.[2] A lot had changed since then, and the journal with its third name was back to being
the scientific publication of the German Society for Thoracic and Cardiovascular alone.
There are various reasons for this, not the least of them being the constant thriving
of the European society and its associated EJCTS in an increasingly competitive market. A total of 76 articles was published in 2003,
with the cardiac portion declining somewhat to 46 (60%), probably for similar causes.
With the growing refinements of techniques, the dramatic development of interventional
cardiology, as well as changing demographics cardiac surgery was now increasingly
offered in high-risk situations, proving its worth.[29]
[30]
[31]
[32] Articles on lung transplantation and the controversial volume reduction surgery
show that thoracic surgery was also expanding its horizons.[33]
[34]
[35]
[36]
2008
By 2008, W.P. Klövekorn had introduced several changes to the journal he had been
editing for 12 years. 2005 saw Thieme Publishers' implementation of the fully electronic
ScholarOne manuscript submission system by Thomson Reuters (http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/tcsurgeon). Very appropriately, the first article entered this way was of German origin.[37] This new tool greatly facilitated the editorial management of the constantly increasing
submission numbers which finally led to the extension of ThCVS to eight instead of six issues per year in 2006. This added volume is reflected by
the 2008 statistics which show 132 articles being published, 71 with a cardiac focus.
Unfortunately, basking in success was not granted to the editor for long, who fell
severely ill.
2013
When the 60th anniversary of the journal arrived, more profound changes had taken
place. Due to the illness of W.P. Klövekorn, which finally led to his untimely death,[38]
[39] a new Editor-in-Chief had to be found in 2010. M.K. Heinemann from Mainz was finally
elected by the German society and Thieme Publishers. He started “eFirst” publishing
in 2011, which assigns a DOI (Digital Object Identifier) number to an article as soon
as the typeset version has been approved. This makes an article fully citable and
accessible on the internet before it finally appears in print. In 2012, the publisher
suggested a new, more modern layout. It also moved the management together with that
of other English language journals to Thieme Medical Publishers based in New York
as well as the production team to Noida near New Delhi in India. ThCVS had suddenly become a truly international affair.
To cope with the increasing demands a daughter journal, ThCVS Reports, was introduced in December 2012, subedited by A. Böning from Giessen. This publishes
the numerous case reports, always popular with the surgical community, in an Open
Access format. Sad developments in the world of scientific publishing necessitated
the implementation of plagiarism search software.
In 2013, the German Society for Pediatric Cardiology (DGPK) decided to have the abstracts
of its annual congress published as a second supplement of ThCVS. This can be regarded as a clear signal of the close relationship these two specialties
have always had, with cardiac surgery having been “invented” in the 1950s to alleviate
congenital heart disease.[40] The Swiss Society for Cardiac and Thoracic Vascular Surgery (SGHC/SCC) renewed its
association with the journal, and the Austrian society intends to do so in 2014.
The new editor's interest in the secrets of editing a scientific journal led to a
presentation at the International Congress on Peer Review and Biomedical Publication,
trying to answer the question if readers do actually read what peer reviewers selected
for them.[41]
