Integrated Healthcare Journal: New venture between the RPS and The BMJ now accepting submissions

An online, open access journal covering joined-up care across the health and social care network has been launched by The Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) and The BMJ.

The 
Integrated Healthcare Journal

 (IHJ) will focus on “quality issues, and patient safety issues, which often stem from fragmentation of care”, said Paresh Dawda, the new journal’s editor-in-chief.

“This journal is about integration as being the solution to fragmented healthcare.”

Dawda trained and worked as a GP in the UK before moving to Australia, where he is currently director of Prestatantia Health. He splits his time between clinical practice — focusing on patients with complex and chronic conditions — and consultancy and advisory work.

He is also adjunct professor at the University of Canberra and honorary associate professor at the Australian National University.

Dawda says integrated care is a “global issue”, and one that means different things to different people.

“There’s no one way of doing integrated healthcare. It’s very context specific and, therefore, the focus and the learnings, and the cross-fertilisation that can happen from those learnings, becomes really important,” he said.

“This journal can be a really powerful vehicle to share those learnings.”

The idea for the IHJ stemmed from a co-creation workshop held between The
BMJ and the RPS on 16 February 2016.

Michael Dowdall, executive editor of research and learning at The Pharmaceutical Journal, who has been part of the IHJ’s development from the beginning, said: “The RPS and The BMJ already had an established relationship as publishers with the British National Formulary”.

“That is a successful partnership which works really well. So, at the workshop, we looked at where we had shared objectives and priorities, and how could we further that existing relationship.”

Dowdall said this led to the idea of a new journal.

The IHJ has a global, multidisciplinary reach, which is reflected in the editorial board. 

“In our strategic advisory board, we’ve got representation from the United States, the UK and Australia, and in the editorial board we’ve got representation from all the developed countries, and across disciplines as well: doctors, academics, pharmacists, nurse practitioners,” Dawda said.

Authors submitting research papers to the journal must include a patient and public involvement statement, detailing how patients were involved in the research. Dowdall explained that includes showing how patient priorities, experiences and preferences were included at various stages of the research process.

It also incorporates dissemination of the research results, Dowdall said, for example, if relevant patient groups share results with wider patient communities.

Having IHJ be fully open access is a first for the RPS. “I think it’s really important, given the activity that’s happening out there in the [integrated healthcare] space — people on the shop floor, as it were, have access to information and cross-fertilisation,” Dawda said.

Allison Lang, publishing director at The
BMJ, said: “[The
BMJ is] excited to be partnering with the RPS to launch this new journal, which aims to unite healthcare professionals in a common mission to improve all aspects of care for individuals and communities orientated around a person-centred philosophy.”

Tony Scully, publisher of The Pharmaceutical Journal, said: “One of the big challenges in modern healthcare is integrating the various specialties across the settings of primary and secondary care. Research published in this journal will be about transforming the patient experience and enabling the healthcare system to produce better outcomes.”

As an open access journal, the IHJ levies an article processing charge on authors, which in the EU varies from £1,000 to £1,700. However, this charge will be waived for articles submitted before 31 December 2019.