FAQs: Medical Journals Backfiles Digitisation Project
What is the Medical Journals Backfiles Digitisation Project?
What are the project aims?
What is PubMed Central?
Which journals are you planning to digitise?
How did you select which journals to digitise?
How will the archive be made accessible?
Can you outline the digitisation specification?
Will the current issues of participating journals be freely available through PubMed Central (PMC)?
Who are the target audiences for this archive?
Are there any plans for expansion of the project in the short and long-term?
Where can I find further information?
What is the Medical Journals Back-files Digitisation Project?
The Wellcome Trust, in partnership with the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) and the National Library of Medicine (NLM), is working on a project to digitise the complete backfiles of a number of important and historically
significant medical journals. The digitised content will be made freely available on the internet – via PubMed Central – and will augment the content already available there.
The Wellcome Library exists as a resource to provide access to the documentary record of medicine. This project is one way of translating that vision into the digital age.
What are the project aims?
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To create a critical mass of digital content, freely available on the web, based on the complete backfiles of a number of key medical journals.
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To ensure that digital files are preserved in perpetuity.
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To work in partnership with the NLM, which will host the archive via PubMed Central.
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To add-value to the digital objects through techniques such as OCR (optical character recognition) processing, thus facilitating full-text searching, and by creating an XML citation for inclusion in PubMed MEDLINE for every digitised article.
What is PubMed Central?
PubMed Central (PMC) is an archive of life science journal literature operated by NCBI, a division of the US National Library of Medicine. PMC is not a publisher. Participation by publishers in PMC is voluntary, although participating journals must meet certain editorial standards. Access to PMC is free and unrestricted. Further information is available from the PMC website.
Which journals are you planning to digitise?
Funding from the Wellcome Trust and JISC will allow the project to digitise at least 1.7 million pages. Depending on which journals are digitised (and how big the backfile archives are) it is anticipated that around a dozen journals will be digitised.
A list of those journal titles that have been approached and have agreed to participate in this project is available on this site. This list will augment the collection of digitised journals that the National Library of Medicine is digitising. A complete list of these titles can be found on the PMC website.
How did you select which journals to digitise?
In selecting candidate titles for digitisation the Library considered the following factors:
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ISI impact factor/total number of cites/cited half-life
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historical significance
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inclusion in Brandon/Hill Selected List of Books and Journals [PDF 221KB] and/or Core Collection of Medical Books and Journals
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length of back-run
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the need to develop a balanced collection - ensuring the titles complemented the collection already being digitised by the NLM
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the need to cover a range of subjects and disciplines
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recognition of the need to keep within a manageable budgetary envelope.
How will the archive be made accessible?
Digitised journals will be made available through the National Library of Medicine's PubMed Central website. No charges will be levied to access this archive.
In addition to creating a digital copy of every page in the back-files, the digitisation process will also:
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create a PDF for every discrete item (article, editorial, letter, advertisements, etc.) in the archive
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subject the text to OCR (optical character recognition), thus facilitating free-text searching across the entire archive
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create an XML citation for every article that is not currently in PubMed (i.e. all pre 1953 material) - this citation will then be added to PubMed, thus allowing users to find relevant articles by author/title/keyword access points.
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Can you outline the digitisation specification?
The digitisation process is being managed by the NLM. Details of the digitisation process and file specification can be found on the PMC website.
Will the current issues of participating journals be freely available through PubMed Central (PMC)?
Publishers who agree to participate in this project are obliged to deposit current issues (produced electronically) in PMC. Publishers, however, are permitted to place an embargo on access to current issues through PMC, thus ensuring that revenue streams from these subscriptions are not compromised. See the PMC website for details about depositing and providing access to full text.
Who are the target audiences for this archive?
The archive will be marketed to a wide group of users including the research, teaching and clinical communities throughout the world. It will, of course, be freely available to anyone who has an internet connection and a web browser.
Are there any plans for expansion of the project in the short and long term?
The Wellcome Trust and JISC's current funding commitment will pay for the digitisation of around a dozen titles. We are hopeful, however, that once a critical mass of journals has been digitised (and is freely available) other publishers will want to participate in this project. However, the cost of digitising these backfiles will have to be met from sources other than the
Wellcome Trust and JISC.
Where can I find further information?
Hopefully, this document will have provided answers to some of your questions. If you have any further questions, please contact Robert Kiley, Head of Systems Strategy: r.kiley@wellcome.ac.uk.
More information about PubMed Central is available from the PubMed Central website.
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