EDITORIAL

Educación Médica, the way of excellence

Educación Médica, camino de la excelencia

Arcadi Gual Sala

Director de Educación Médica. E-mail: agual@ub.edu

It gives me great pleasure to introduce readers of Educación Médica (Educ Med), the new format of the journal. Since it first appeared 10 years ago, and throughout the 40 issues and 10 supplements that have appeared in that time, we have remained faithful to the format and layout of the first issue. Over the years, tastes, trends and, above all, our readers’ needs have changed and we therefore feel the journal needs to be adapted so as to make it more flexible, more dynamic, easier to access, more appealing and, in short, more useful. As of this issue, Viguera Editores is now responsible for editing the journal, which we hope will satisfy both subscribers and occasional readers.

Our intention is not only to introduce a change of image but also to get closer to the reader. Th roughout the year 2008 we aim to advance in a number of different matters. The journal will have its own website, which will make it easier to access and allow a greater degree of interaction between readers and Educ Med. We want to encourage all professionals who are somehow involved in medical education (at graduate, postgraduate and continuing education levels) to participate in the letters section of the journal Educ Med. By so doing we hope it will continue to serve as a meeting point where ideas, opinions, comments and criticism regarding the training of health science professionals can be exchanged in a respectful and open-minded manner. Such opinions and constructive criticism could be a valuable aid if they were disseminated more widely in all the spheres related to the training of our professionals. This would be especially true in the case of those responsible for training management, both in the diff erent administrations and in academic institutions.

But all these changes in format and even the modifications involving the layout would be pointless without everybody’s desire to improve the quality of both the journal Educ Med and medical education itself. Medical education, as an area of knowledge within our sociocultural environment, must set out on the path to excellence, as it did several decades ago in the English-speaking world. On this journey, both Educ Med and the Fundación Educación Médica can only do their little bit, that is to say, contribute with serious and impartial management, rigorous information that has been checked against the best scientifi c evidence, and peer reviews of the original contributions to the journal, but not much else. Teachers and students, managers and politicians, public and private institutions –we must all commit ourselves to following the way to excellence. Our train has left a little late, but the important thing is to go on without stopping. Th e important thing is to reach our destination.