Medicine, psychiatry, empiricism and a little magic To better meet the high standards expected by our readers and members of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, we asked what they thought of our journals. Although only a smallish proportion of you responded, it seems the print version of the BJPsych is highly valued. Other suggestions were to retain more clinically relevant papers rather than 'impenetrable statistical' details that are glossed over. Each specialty still favours more papers from its own tribe, and the traditional dualisms were prominent among the responses: biological v. sociological, genetic v. non-genetic, qualitative v. quantitative, short v. long, interesting v. boring, statistical v. narrative. Some wanted a more 'scientific' journal, some more original research rather than reviews, and some no longer had time to devote to reading a scientific journal owing to the demands of everyday practice. I have every free text comment about the BJPsych, so whatever you said is noted. Clinical updates of an educational nature were proposed, and surprisingly, the obituaries section seemed very popular. Obituaries are published occasionally in the BJPsych and regularly in the Psychiatric Bulletin. Henry Rollin was the editor for the obituary section almost up until his death in February 2014, aged 102 (his own obituary was published in the BMJ and the Psychiatric Bulletin). Before Rollin's death, my predecessor Peter Tyrer paid tribute to the incredible life of Rollin as the first 'centenarian extraordinaire who was a member of the College and a psychiatrist.1 At the same time Peter challenged future editors to honour future centenarian members of the College. I ask for your help to achieve this, so do inform me of extraordinary people who have given much to patients, the profession and society.
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