DELAYS IN THE LITERATURE OF MEDICAL MICROBIOLOGY: BEFORE AND AFTER PUBLICATION

Authors often accuse journal editors of excessive delays in publishing articles. The interval between acceptance and publication of an article is an average of five months in medicine and nine months from submission to publication in psychology. A further delay, which has received less attention, is the time for delivery of a journal to the library or the delay before index or abstract publications arrive. Delivery times should be small in North America and Western Europe where most journals and secondary publications are produced, but might be much longer for other continents.