Dear Jon,
Greetings from Southend on the east coast of England.
According to the Journal's home page, “The Journal seeks to apply scientific
rigor to the study of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM)
modalities, particularly traditional Asian healing systems. eCAM emphasizes
health outcome, while documenting biological mechanisms of action. The
journal is devoted to the advancement of science in the field of basic
research, clinical studies, methodology or scientific theory in diverse
areas of Biomedical Sciences”.
The + points I see with this journal are:
Open access
Free submission
A reputed publisher – Oxford University press
One study I looked at was a pilot study of Ozone therapy for tumour
oxygenation.
http://ecam.oupjournals.org/cgi/content/full/1/1/93
The paper was similar in quality of published papers in indexed journals
although I did not undertake formal critical review.
The first issue of the journal deals with basic research and hopefully the
later issues will present research among patients in the clinical setting.
Often in the NHS we are asked for evidence for various CAM to make a funding
decision locally. So any efforts to provide and disseminate patient centred
evidence in this area is laudable and welcome.
I am sure that as always papers published will undergo rigorous critical
appraisal before they are fed in to the decision making process.
It may be worth noting these few lines in the journal’s first editorial
http://www.ecam.oupjournals.org/cgi/content/full/1/1/1 “these (CAM)
treatments have not undergone strict testing, they are not always safe and
the same drug may have different effects according to the individual patient
and dosage. Complicated considerations are necessary for the application of
practices such as those found in Chinese traditional medicine. Quality
control is also important for the safe use of natural products. Due to the
above difficulties, this realm of medicine has often been shut out of the
serious journals of Western medicine. Our eCAM is launched in a desire to
ameliorate this situation, by encouraging the publication of original
scientific papers based on sound scientific guidelines, but without
prejudice against the possible efficacy of these new and ancient
treatments.”
In a nutshell, I think the journal is a welcome development which is trying
to bring scientific rigour to the world of CAM which has so long been a myth
to most of us.
Apologies for this lengthy reply.
Warm regards,
Badri
P.S: Conflict of interest - I am a an advocate and supporter of open access
publishing.
Dr.P.Badrinath MD, BS, M.Phil, MPH, PhD (Cantab), MFPH
Specialist Registrar in Public Health & Recognised Clinical Teacher,
Southend-on-Sea PCT & University of Cambridge, UK
http://myprofile.cos.com/badrishanthi
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