Margaret Comerford Freda, EdD, RN, CHES, FAAN
MCN The American Journal of Maternal Child Nursing
Editor, MCN The American Journal of Maternal Child Nursing. Began January 1, 1998
Prior Editor’s Position: Editorial review boards
Years as Editor: Since 1998
Years in INANE: Since 1998
Other Position: Professor, Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Women’s Health, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Montefiore Medical Center, NYC
Accomplishments: I’m extremely proud of the work I have done to help increase the number of nursing journals indexed by Thomson Reuters for Impact Factors. After learning at an INANE conference that nursing was barely represented in the scientific journals with impact factors (33 nursing journals out of 7500 journals in other science fields) I took it upon myself to launch an effort to do this, and was ably assisted by Dr. Judy Lewis and by several members of the Medical Library Association, who supported these efforts fully. Our work resulted in a total change of course for Thomson concerning nursing journals. In the first year of our activity, they increased the nursing journals being studied for Impact Factors by 74%. Today, in 2011, there are 85 nursing journals with impact factors, and new journals are added yearly.
I’m also very proud to have begun a new area of research in nursing – that of examining the scholarly work of being a nursing editor. Dr. Margaret Kearney and I studied an international sample of nursing editors, and subsequently published 5 articles in the nursing literature describing the results of our survey examining how nursing editors accomplish multiple aspects of their work all over the world. This was followed by a collaboration between Dr. Kearney, Dr. Mickey Dougherty, Dr. Judith Baggs, Dr. Marion Broome and myself to determine how nurse peer reviewers do their work for nursing journals internationally. This resulted in 5 articles presenting the results of this research, and serves as some of the only research done on nursing peer reviewers.
Finally, based on the fact that the learning curve for becoming a nursing editor is a long one, I’m proud of the fact that Dr. Leslie Nicoll and I have written an e-book designed to help new nursing editors shorten that learning curve. Published by Lippincott, our book, “The Editor’s Handbook” covers all aspects of becoming and being an editor.
Best thing about being an editor: Helping to influence the literature in my specialty and helping young authors learn how to write for publication.
Worst thing about being an editor: Always, the time pressure
Amusing: Before I became an editor, I thought the work would be easy. Ah, the naivete of youth.
3 words: Organized, passionate, caring
Strangest request: Asking me to promise, in writing, acceptance of an article based on her famous name, before I saw the manuscript.
If not editor?: My day job—teaching and doing research.
Relax?: Reading—I belong to a book club with 7 women for 27 years; vacationing (beach resort) with my husband of 39 years. Being with 4 grandchildren and 2 daughters. Introducing grandchildren to Broadway and live performances.