New Rheumatology Journal Club Launching on Twitter

A new format for discussion of important publications in rheumatology will debut Thursday, January 29, on Twitter. The new Rheumatology Journal Club (@RheumJC) will launch with a discussion of a study on tacrolimus and mycophenolate mofetil for induction treatment of lupus nephritis, published online in Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases last month.¹[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_crop","fid":"31307","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image media-image-right","id":"media_crop_5200573830679","media_crop_h":"0","media_crop_image_style":"-1","media_crop_instance":"3298","media_crop_rotate":"0","media_crop_scale_h":"0","media_crop_scale_w":"0","media_crop_w":"0","media_crop_x":"0","media_crop_y":"0","style":"width: 120px; height: 108px; float: right;","title":" ","typeof":"foaf:Image"}}]]

The publisher has released the online article in full text for free until the completion of the discussion on Twitter.

To encourage international participation, the Rheumatology Journal Club (hashtag #RheumJC) will host two one-hour “live chats” on Twitter on January 29, at 8pm GMT (3pm EST) and at 2am GMT (9pm EST). Each session will last for 24 hours, and the event will conclude with a summary of the discussion at 8pm GMT(3 PM EST) on January 30th.

The plan is to host one live chat per month at #RheumJC.

The founders of RheumJC include two hosts of The Rheumatology Podcast:
•    Suleman Bhana MD, a rheumatologist in private practice in Middletown NY, and
•    Paul Sufka MD, a staff rheumatologist with HealthPartners Medical Group and Regions Hospital in St. Paul MN

as well as the founder of the popular Rheumatology Pearls series of clinical tips:

•   Christopher Collins MD, Assistant Professor of Medicine, Georgetown University Medical Center, and director of the rheumatology fellowship program at Washington Hospital Center

and

•  Aruni Jayatilleke MD, Assistant Professor of Medicine at Drexel University College of Medicine and Associate Program Director for the rheumatology fellowship program.

According to Collins, this is the first journal club to be formed for rheumatology.

The idea to start RheumJC began just following sessions on social media at the November annual meeting of the American College of Rheumatology in Boston, Sufka said in an email. (Bhana, Collins, and Sufka were all presenters at the sessions.)

"I think we were inspired by our involvement of the great rheumatology community on Twitter with great interaction and engagement at ACR14," he wrote. "We were also highly impressed with other Twitter journal clubs run by other fields, especially NephJC.com."

The founders intend to publish their own article about lessons learned in creating #RheumJC.

(Bhana and Collins are Board member advisors to Rheumatology Network.)

References:

1.  Mok CC, Ying KY, Yim CW et al,Tacrolimus versus mycophenolate mofetil for induction therapy of lupus nephritis: a randomised controlled trial and long-term follow-up.Ann Rheum Dis  Published online first 30 December 2014. doi:10.1136/annrheumdis-2014-206456