Freqeuntly Asked Questions

“What is the BMSJ?”

The BMSJ is a medical student journal run entirely by Bristol medical students. The journal was founded by four final year medical students in the 2021/2022 academic year.

The founding team included:

  • Harvey Johnson (Executive)
  • Shruthi Sankaranarayanan (Editor and marketing lead)
  • Henry Carlton (Editor and IT lead)
  • Felix Miller-Molloy (Editor and design lead)

Following extensive planning, the founding committee proposed the journal to the medical school, gaining their support. The BMSJ accepts Bristol medical student articles from all year groups, peer review is conducted by senior medical students.

“What are the BMSJ’s aims?”

Our mission statement is to: showcase work worthy of recognition, while promoting a nurturing academic environment for students to learn and develop their skills.

We understand that it is challenging for students to bridge the gap between undergraduate assignments and authentic research of publishable standard. The BMSJ hopes to challenge students to write papers, appraise each other’s work and gain an understanding of the peer review process.

“Does publication count for the foundation programme/specialty applications?”

In short, publication in a student journal does not count for points in such applications for doctors. However, it can still be included on CV’s or discussed in interviews. The reason for this is because peer review is conducted by students and the article will not be PubMed indexed. In future it may be indexed in google scholar. Publication in the BMSJ should be seen as a learning opportunity and a way to share your work with the local Bristol medical school community.

“How does peer-review work?”

In practice, researchers may be asked to peer-review papers based on expertise or regular publication in a specific field of science. We have modified this slightly and are recruiting Y5 students to sign up to peer review with their area of interest. We feel this will be a positive and CV focussed opportunity for students in the senior years of medical school.