Millburn surgeon finds Rx to help less fortunate - NJVoices: Bob Braun

"Open access plastic surgery journal"  -- Stephen

Millburn surgeon finds Rx to help less fortunate

Posted by Bob Braun May 05, 2008 8:23AM

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It's a measure of priorities, an odd one, but telling, says the doctor. In the African island nation of Mauritius, there is one plastic surgeon. In just one nearby hospital here, there are 65.

That Mauritian doctor doesn't do much cosmetic surgery -- face lifts or enhancements of other parts of the anatomy. He repairs faces and bodies disfigured by burns or wounds or accidents of birth.

And he does it with the help of a Millburn plastic surgeon and that doctor's temple congregation.

"He can be overwhelmed," says Mark Granick of fellow doctor R.P. Gunnesee. "He needs all the help he can get."

Granick, who has an assistant from the island, has gone to Mauritius twice with his wife, Carol Singer-Granick, a pediatric endocrinologist -- there are none of that sort of doctor on the island -- both to assist doctors and to bring over needed equipment, some $300,000 worth. He plans to go again this year.

Some instruments were donated by manufacturers, others were purchased with funds raised at Temple B'nai Jeshurun in Short Hills.

But what Gunnesee says he needs even more, Granick says, is current information. Research. New surgical techniques. The sort of material found in clinical journals that are not easily available -- a year's subscription can costs thousands.

So Granick, a professor and chief of plastic surgery at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey at Newark, did what he could do about that, too: He and two others established their own medical journal.

A free online, open-access journal that, while publishing scholarly articles on research in plastic surgery and related fields, also provides doctors all over the world with clinical instruction on surgical techniques.

"In many countries, this sort of information is just not available," says Granick.

The name of the journal is ePlasty: The Open Access Journal of Plastic Surgery.

Granick says the open-access approach of medical publishing offers a number of advantages. The articles are free to readers -- and thereby accessible to doctors working in countries where there simply is no money for journal subscriptions.

"But we insist on the same, rigorous academic standards that all scholarly journals maintain," says Granick. The articles are peer-reviewed, or refereed -- that means they are sent out to experts in the same fields for comments.

The turn-around time, the doctor says, is reduced.

"For a paper journal, it could be 18 months to two years before an article was published," Granick says. "We can get it posted in a matter of a few months. That means getting important new information to doctors throughout the world as quickly as possible."

Unlike paper journals with limited space, open-access, on-line journals have virtually unlimited space.

"So we make decisions on what is important to be published, not on what we have space for," Granick says.

The new journal contains pieces meant to be used in the training of residents and a presentation section that allows a multimedia format for showing just how surgical procedures are performed. Actual operations can be recorded and posted in the journal.

Only one section, a forum for the exchange of ideas, is limited because of federal privacy rules.

Like paper journals, ePlasty is supported by advertising from companies that sell, among other things, surgical instruments and other devices. The publication, which had its formal opening last month, so far is not self-supporting. Granick, his co-editor Stephen Milner of Johns Hopkins, and managing editor John Kucan of Southern Illinois University support the journal with their own funds.

"We do expect it to be financially independent soon," says Granick.

Advertisers can post information in what the journal calls "the exhibit hall."

"We've made it similar to the exhibit halls at medical conventions," he says.

That includes posted films of the touted instruments and devices in actual use.

"You can't do that in a paper journal," he says.

Millburn surgeon finds Rx to help less fortunate - NJVoices: Bob Braun