Editorial report

THE FIFTH-YEAR ANNIVERSARY OF THE BANTAO JOURNAL

December 2007

The BANTAO Journal is the official publication of the Balkan Cities Association of Nephrology, Dialysis, Transplantation and Artificial Organs (BANTAO). Published twice a year it is perceived as a connecting bond between the Balkan nephrologists and the members of the BANTAO Association, gathering messages from and between our congresses to be shared among us all in the field of prevention and treatment of kidney diseases.

The BANTAO Association was born 1993 in Ohrid but the first Congress was held in Varna (1995). The tradition has been established with the following seven successful congresses in Struga (1997), Belgrade (1998), Izmir (1999), Thessaloniki (2001), Varna (2003), Ohrid (2005) and Belgrade (2007). Hence, the BANTAO Congress became not just a professional but also a cultural phenomenon, discovering that we have many more things in common than we previously thought, and that we have the advantage to live and communicate in a world without political boundaries.

The first BANTAO Journal appeared in 2003 in Varna with Prof. D. Nenov as Editor and Dr. V. Nenov as his assistant. At the General Assembly of our BANTAO Association in Ohrid 2005, A. Basci (Izmir) was elected Editor in Chief and G. Spasovski (Skopje) and A. Covic (Iasi) were elected as Deputy Editors. M. Polenakovic (Skopje), D. Nenov (Varna), Lj. Djukanovic (Belgrade) and Ch. Stathakis (Greece) were appointed as associated editors. At the General Assembly in Belgrade 2007 V. Nenov was elected as Deputy Editor in charge for Medline application and development and maintenance of the web site of our BANTAO association www.bantao.org. All published issues of BANTAO Journal could be found as a free online content at the same web site.

At this small anniversary we are proud to announce 267 papers already published in these ten issues of BANTAO Journal. In addition, the majority of publications belong to the members of BANTAO Association and the individual contribution per country is presented in the Table below.

Based on a continuous improvement on the Journal content and design and formally the five years of regular biannual issuing, we'll turn on with the application procedure for Medline citation and hopefully we would be successful within the next year.

Finally, celebrating the fifth-year anniversary in this issue of BANTAO Journal we do congratulate all the members and readers and wish a good and successful collaboration on further progress of the Journal.

We encourage you to submit your manuscripts to be published in the BANTAO Journal and to help its further strengthening and growing in parallel with our BANTAO Association!