MCN's 50th Anniversary

This year we celebrate the 50th anniversary of MCN, The American Journal of Maternal Child Nursing. To prepare for the anniversary, I opened all 300 past issues of MCN to see what type of content was offered initially and as time went on. Barbara E. Bishop, MN, RN, FAAN, was the first editor of MCN and began in January of 1976 (Bishop, 1976). She was a visionary nurse leader, well ahead of her time in maternity and pediatric nursing. She wrote inspiring editorials and did not shy away from controversial issues. Her focus at first was on clinical articles that could immediately be used in practice and mentoring staff nurses to share their clinical insights. In 1976, a new journal needed 1,500 subscriptions before starting, as per criteria from our publisher Lippincott, but MCN had only 500 at first (Bishop, 1996). Lippincott published the first issue on faith and by the fourth issue in July 1976, MCN was profitable, and at the end of the first year, there were 25,000 subscribers (Bishop, 1996). Several regular columns were part of her tenure as editor including Professionally Speaking (covered various professional nursing issues), Pharmacopoeia (review of medications in maternity and pediatric nursing), Focus on Legal Issues, and Focus on Patient Teaching. In March of 1978, she introduced a column The Research Circuit, that reviewed recently published studies. This was the precursor to our current column of the same purpose Toward Evidence Based Practice. In May 1981, a new column, Keys to Research was started and continued until 1998 authored by three well-known nurse researchers during that time. In the next issue in July 1981, the editorial was about how nursing research was going to be presented in the journal and encouraging nurses to submit manuscripts detailing their nursing research. Here are some of her own words from her first editorial: Nurses in maternal child health have realized that to give competent nursing care, one must also understand the political issues which can affect nursing practice: legislative changes, the power struggle within the political system, the entire arena of quality assurance, the factors in national health insurance, and interorganizational tensions (Bishop, 1976). Each issue featured letters to the editor, book and film reviews, announcements of various conferences, and continuing education opportunities. There was a special section Accolades in some issues of the journal where awards of nurses in the field were highlighted. Many of the most well-known nurse scientists had their research published in MCN. I was surprised to learn of MCN conventions, at least four that were discussed in the journal. They were 2- to 3-day conventions in different cities with a number of presentations on maternity and pediatric nursing and from the descriptions and pictures, were well attended. The American Nurses Association owned the AJN Company that started the American Journal of Nursing 1900. In 1953, Nursing Research and Nursing Outlook were added to their portfolio (Bishop, 1996). They contracted with Lippincott as the publisher. In August 1996, the AJN company sold all of their journal holdings to Lippincott-Raven publishers. So then Lippincott became our owner and continued as our publisher. Bishop (1996) on the sale of AJN holdings to Lippincott. Lippincott-Raven is committed to nurses and the profession of nursing as well as to quality products. Such a commitment offers a promise of a bright tomorrow for MCN and the very experienced and/or advanced practice nurses who are our subscribers - a continued promise to deliver the best content possible. As we have since our founding, we will attempt to support those of you who provide nursing care in all settings - hospitals, the home, and community ambulatory care - for families during childbearing and the childrearing years. After 22 years as editor, Barbara Bishop retired following publication of the last issue of 1997. Margaret Comerford Freda, EdD, RN, CHES, FAAN began as editor in January of 1998. Dr. Freda had taken over as author of the Focus on Patient Education column a few months earlier in 1997. She added more research articles to the journal with a goal of having a 50/50 composition of clinical practice and research articles. Dr. Freda took the lead role in the process to have MCN and other nursing journals listed in the Thompson Reuters Citation Reports (now known as Clarviate Citation reports) so MCN could have an impact factor and be recognized for its significant contributions to the literature and the science of nursing. This was a huge accomplishment for her and for nursing in general. She added columns on specialty topics such as nutrition, health informatics, recently published studies, global health, a second opinion format where nurse experts debated hot topics, and engaged perinatal and pediatric nurse leaders to be columnists. Dr. Freda continued the work started by Barbara Bishop in mentoring and encouraging staff nurses and early career scholars to submit manuscripts for publication. As Bishop had previously, Freda organized special issues on focused topics several times a year. Dr. Freda initiated MCN Paper of the Year Awards, which continue today. She organized a special issue to celebrate the 25th anniversary of MCN that included many researchers and clinicians offering their thoughts on the past 25 years of maternity and pediatric nursing. Dr. Freda wrote many important editorials but my favorites were when she talked about her family. We all learned about her daughter's wedding, birth of her grandchildren, and her experiences as an inpatient. Here are some of her own words from her editorial (Freda, 2000) on the 25th anniversary of MCN: I became MCN's Editor in January, 1998. As most of us find when we take over a job from someone else, I learned quickly that I had to choose my own path, and the path I chose for the journal was evidence-based practice. It seemed to me that with the immense changes in nursing during the past several decades-in particular, health care reform in the guise of managed care with emphasis on outcomes and the bottom line-evidence-based care was an absolute essential of any nurse's armamentarium for the future. I consider the Editorship of MCN to be the greatest professional gift I've ever been given. I have the chance to influence the nursing literature in my specialty in a positive manner and, therefore, to influence nursing practice. It is an awesome responsibility, but a magnificent one. Margaret Comerford Freda was the MCN editor until January of 2014 when I became editor. Freda's last editorial (2014) covered things she had accomplished and her best wishes for the future. I'm very, very proud of what I've been able to accomplish in the 16 years I've been the editor of MCN. I decided to make evidence-based practice the calling card of MCN, making sure that all articles, whether practice or research, were based on solid evidence in the literature, and that nurses reading the journal would always be able to use the information they read to enhance their practice. I actively solicited clinical researchers to submit their clinically-relevant research to MCN, always editing the articles to make sure that the research was both readable and practical. I also spent a huge amount of time mentoring authors, encouraging authors who had a good idea but didn't know how to get it on the page, and using the editing process as a teaching opportunity. I led the effort to [get an impact factor for MCN] which is [important] as it represents an enormous boost in MCN's international reputation, and a very sizeable increase in authors who want to submit their work to the journal. Dr. Simpson's Perspectives on the 50th Anniversary of MCN Being a journal editor was not a role I sought or something I wanted to do, in all honesty. I was already the senior editor of AWHONN's (Association of Women's Health, Obstetric, and Neonatal Nursing) Perinatal Nursing and was unsure about taking on this new role. I agreed to give it a 6-month trial because Dr. Freda, my mentor, asked me to consider it. During those first months as editor, my mother became ill and it was clear that I needed to make some changes in my professional life to be able to take care of her. Although I have four siblings, they are all men and they relied on me as the only girl and a nurse. I really could have used a sister. I decided to leave my hospital job in labor and delivery after 30 years and do my best for my mother. As a result, I also had the opportunity to devote more time to the journal. Being MCN editor could be done from home while I made sure all was well with my mother. I had a virtual job before it was hip. The publisher assigned a mentor to me for the first 6 months. Without her guidance and support I would not have continued. She was amazing. I decided I liked being a journal editor after all and it was unique way to make a difference. Most journal editors at that time were from the academic setting. I felt a bit out of my league at first as a hospital-based clinician and scientist in the role of editor. It took a few years to feel comfortable with the process. I added quality improvement articles and scholarly review articles along with two new columns on hot topics in maternity and pediatric nursing. After several years, when the author of the nutrition column retired, the column was changed to specifically breastfeeding. When the author of the column on health informatics retired, that column did not continue as nurses were so much more in tune with electronic health records, online searches, data bases, and social media than they had been when the column was started. I often wonder how Dr. Freda would think about MCN in its current state. I hope she would be pleased. I would love to call her to get her thoughts but unfortunately, she died in April 2015. I miss her a lot and think of her often. Dr. Freda was a mentor like no other. She was always encouraging me and putting me in places to enhance my career. She was the chair of the March of Dimes National Nurse Advisory Committee. When a vacancy occurred, she nominated me and introduced me to a wonderful group of nurturing maternity and neonatal nurse experts. She said “These are my friends and colleagues and now they are yours too.” That turned out to be a true statement. She was a member of my dissertation committee and my primary sponsor for fellowship in the American Academy of Nursing. Stepping into Dr. Freda's shoes was daunting as you can imagine. I have tried to live up to her expectations. One of her requests was for me to pay it forward to early career nurse scholars in honor of her mentorship. In 2016, Annie Rohan, PhD, RN, FAANP, FAAN joined as associate editor. In 2020, we started the MCN Editorial Fellowship in which we mentor early career nurse scholars in the publishing, editing, and peer review process. We are now in our 6th fellowship and have had over 50 fellow participants. We have raised the MCN impact factor over time to a high of 2.5 and continue to attract high-quality submissions. Dr. Freda was a mentor to Dr. Rohan as well and the fellowship is our way of paying it forward as she asked. We hope for many more successful years for the journal. Dr. Rohan's Perspectives on the 50th Anniversary of MCN Being involved in journal editing was also something I had not desired, or maybe just had not considered, until 2002 or 2003 when, while working as a neonatal nurse practitioner, I received a call from a journal editor who had read a short project report that I had published with a physician colleague in the Journal of Perinatology. Dr. Freda invited me to join her journal as a reviewer. It turned out to be a pivotal moment in my career, as the opportunity was coupled with her mentorship. As a practice-oriented advanced practice nurse, I did not have a program of research, so did not consider myself a qualified first author. Nevertheless, once I became comfortable as a reviewer, she prodded me to the next level… “You never know when these things will be important!” What started as a short column submission, ended as a three-part practice series of articles on the diagnosis and management of hypoxia in the term newborn (Rohan & Golombek, 2009a, 2009b, 2009c) that were awarded the 2009 MCN Best Practice Articles of the Year and are still being used to provide content and context in nurse education. MCN's laser focus on meeting the needs of a readership of practicing nurses remains as mission-centric now as it did then. Dr. Freda figured out how to use email quicker and more effectively than anyone I knew. Like many of her MCN mentees, I'd log into my Yahoo! account every evening to find her messages. “Can you tell me about what you are doing at your job? I want to nominate you for something, and it might make a difference.” She cajoled me into writing an editorial, and later into trying out the role of guest editor for a 40th Anniversary Special Topics issue. It was in January of 2014, prior to publication of that special issue, that I received a message from her husband. “Margaret is heartbroken to tell you that she must resign from MCN effective immediately…she wants you to know what a privilege it has been to work with all of you, and that she can never thank you enough for everything you've all done for her and for the journal. Your work as reviewers has made MCN the strong voice for evidence-based nursing that it is… rest assured that the journal will be handled by someone who can give it the attention it deserves.” Dr. Freda was correct on all fronts. MCN was and continues to be a strong voice for evidence-based nursing. That publication, that nomination…all of it made a difference in my career. And Dr. Kathleen Rice Simpson, whose name I only knew as a nationally renowned expert and who I now am privileged to call both colleague and friend, stepped up with more talent and vision than Margaret could have ever imagined, to navigate the journal through a transformative time in publication, and to become one of the nation's leading nursing specialty journals. Like so many other aspiring or established nurse scholars, I am forever grateful to both for their mentorship, for providing opportunities in publishing to educate and innovate, and for their endless dedication to elevating the voice and health of mothers and babies. Previous Editors Margaret Comerford Freda, EdD, RN, CHES, FAAN Editor Jan 1998 to Jan 2014 Barbara E. Bishop, MN, RN, FAAN Editor Jan 1976 to Dec 1997