7th Inning Stretch

First, I should explain what the “7th inning stretch” is to the many readers who may not be familiar with American baseball. In each inning in baseball, both teams come to bat and are allowed three outs (the definition of an “out” is not important here). Each baseball game consists of nine innings (unless there is a tie at the end of nine innings, but again this is not important for this editorial). At the beginning of the 7th inning, it is custom for the fans watching the game to stand up and stretch. In keeping with my custom of sharing the status of the journal with the readership from time to time (usually in the January issue), this is our 7th inning stretch. The Associate Editors and I initially agreed to serve for 3 years with an “option to renew” for 2 more years (if the American Diabetes Association [ADA] so wishes). We all renewed with the exception of Mark Peyrot, PhD, who had served 2 years with the previous editorial team as well as 3 years with us and certainly deserved a rest, and Richard Rubin, PhD, who has just started as the Vice President, Health Care and Education, of the ADA and will have many new responsibilities. I thank both of them for their outstanding contributions to keep the journal in the forefront of psychosocial research in diabetes. Thus, the current editorial team has completed 3 of 5 years (not quite six of nine innings, but close enough).

The best news to share with you is that the impact factor for Diabetes Care has greatly increased from 5.477 in 2002 to 7.501 in 2003. The impact factor is a measure of the frequency with which the “average” article in a journal …