TY - JOUR T1 - Embracing the future of medical journals JF - British Journal of General Practice JO - Br J Gen Pract SP - 423 LP - 423 DO - 10.3399/bjgp13X670723 VL - 63 IS - 613 AU - Euan Lawson Y1 - 2013/08/01 UR - http://bjgp.org/content/63/613/423.abstract N2 - Medical journals are far from perfect. A former editor of the BMJ, Richard Smith, wrote a whole book setting out the problems.1 Bias of various hues has plagued the literature. Conflicts of interest abound, authorship has been controversial, and the pharmaceutical industry and commercial pressures have influenced content. There is the ongoing challenge of the peer review process that stubbornly refuses to be superseded by anything better. All the flaws have been highlighted and debated.Journals have already moved a long way in less than a generation. Britpop was in full swing, Blur versus Oasis, when I was at medical school handsearching the Index Medicus. Medical journals were roughly on a par with telephone directories when it came to readability and it required physical stamina to complete the briefest of literature reviews. The only … ER -