SEAJME : 12 years of Progress

South East Asian Association of Medical Education (SEARAME) is one of the six regional associations under the umbrella of the World Federation of Medical Education (WFME, 2003), the global non-governmental organization dedicated to setting standards in medical education. SEARAME was established in 2006 with the aim of improving the quality and relevance of medical education in countries of the South East Asian region (SEAR)at all levels; undergraduate, postgraduate and continuing professional development. One of the main objectives of SEARAME is to encourage scholarship in medical education including educational research in SEAR countries. The South East Asian Journal of Medical Education (SEAJME) is the culmination of the SEARAME's vision to bring together medical educationists in the region and promote collaborative efforts toward uplifting the standards of medical education in the region and beyond through dissemination of research, evidence-based knowledge and information (SEAJME, 2007; Karunathilake, 2007).


Introduction
South East Asian Association of Medical Education (SEARAME) is one of the six regional associations under the umbrella of the World Federation of Medical Education (WFME, 2003), the global non-governmental organization dedicated to setting standards in medical education. SEARAME was established in 2006 with the aim of improving the quality and relevance of medical education in countries of the South East Asian region (SEAR)at all levels; undergraduate, postgraduate and continuing professional development. One of the main objectives of SEARAME is to encourage scholarship in medical education including educational research in SEAR countries. The South East Asian Journal of Medical Education (SEAJME) is the culmination of the SEARAME's vision to bring together medical educationists in the region and promote collaborative efforts toward uplifting the standards of medical education in the region and beyond through dissemination of research, evidence-based knowledge and information (SEAJME, 2007;Karunathilake, 2007). Furthermore, Medical Education in the SEAR is going through rapid and extensive changes with new methods replacing conventional teaching and learning practices. Some changes seen in the developed world may not necessarily be the best for Asia while some may be driven by resource constraints (Karunathilake, 2007, Sirisup, 2008. Therefore SEAJME would be the ideal platform for the medical educationists and medical teachers in the region to exchange ideas and share experiences in best practices in medical education in order to address academic quality improvement and enhancement of medical education practices based on the highest global standards (WFME, 2003).
The objective of this report is to provide a detailed overview and a critical analysis of the SEAJME's achievements to date.

Methods
A multi-method approach was used. The journal was initially published biannually from Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, Thailand. The contribution of the Chulalongkorn SEARAME secretariat in making SEAJME a medium for dissemination of good practices in medical education in the South East Asia Region has been immense (Sirisup, 2008). In 2014, the editorial office of the journal shifted to the Faculty of Medicine, University of Colombo, Sri Lanka, whilst the Chulalongkorn secretariat continued with the online publishing processes.
The Coimbatore SEARAME secretariat, which was in operation from 2010 to 2017, supported the editorial office with publicity and dissemination responsibilities. WHO provided funding support from 2006 to 2014. Currently the in-kind support for hosting the journal is provided by University of Colombo and Chulalongkorn University, with funding support for editorial assistance provided by the College of Medical Educationists, Sri Lanka (Karunathilake, 2014, Karunathilake, 2018).
With the current issue (2018 June), we have published 12 volumes and 21 issues.

Country-wise distribution of authors
A total of 780 authors representing 34 countries have contributed to the journal. High impact researchers and renowned leaders in Medical Education, both globally and regionally, were among the authors ( Figure 1).  Majority of the articles were on Teaching and Learning (67, 24%), followed by Trends in Medical Education (29, 10%), Professionalism (25, 9%), Community Oriented Learning (19, 7%), Technology enhanced learning (17, 6%) and Basic Science Teaching (16, 5%). The number of articles on Curriculum Development and Evaluation (11 in total) were comparatively low. Figure 3 shows the categorization of articles according to topics. Journal Metrics

Categorization of articles
The quality of the articles published is evident by the growing number of citations. The journal Hindex is 10. The 10 top performing articles published in SEAJME and the number of times they were cited according to Google Scholar (2018) is provided in the table 1.However, the impact factor (calculated based on citations provided by Google scholar) for 2016 is low (0.13).

Indexing Status
Initially   medical education organizations that use SEAJME for reference material include the World Federation for Medical Education (WFME), Association for Medical Education in Europe (AMEE, -Med Ed World); PSG-FAIMER regional institute; Saudi Society of Medical Education (SSME); Instituto de Investigación Practicum, Spain and College of Medical Educationists, Sri Lanka. Inclusion in databases such as freejournals.com and journals4free.com has further increased the accessibility and visibility (AMEE-Med Ed World, 2018, CENMED, 2018, FSG-FAIMER, 2010, WFME, 2007, CME, 2017.

Discussion
The journal has achieved significant milestones over the last decade. During the time period from October 2007 to June 2018, we have published 12 volumes and 21 issues with a total of 265 articles. There have been contributions from 780 authors representing 34 countries from all regions of the world. The number of articles, the diversity of topics and the distribution of authors are clear indications that SEAJME has firmly established its place as the apex medical education journal in the SEA region. The quality of the articles published is evidenced by the growing number of citations. The use of the journal as a resource by leading universities and organizations strongly suggests the success of improvements made in recognition and visibility.
The progress of SEAJME from 2007 to 2018 provides us with a sample of Medical Education research and publications in the SEAR. The findings from topic and content analysis are indicative of research interests, focus and the trends. The focus on areas such as professionalism, technology enhanced learning, community-orientation and PBL clearly indicates a trend towards innovative educational strategies. One important finding is the number of countries and researchers outside SEAR, especially from Malaysia, Singapore, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Vietnam, UK, US, Australia, Japan, New Zealand and Canada, who have made strong contributions to SEAJME. This is indicative of strong international collaborations SEARAME has achieved.
During the 11 years of existence, SEAJME has faced several challenges, logistical and financial. There were serious concerns regarding delays in the journal process leading to a backlog. Over time we have successfully overcome all these challenges, now reaching on-time status with a well-established journal editing and publishing process. The editorial board was recently revised based on identified objective criteria such as the H-index, citation count, editorial experience, reviewer experience and contribution to SEAJME and SEARAME.
The low Impact Factor is a serious concern. It is lower than the impact factor in 2010 (manually calculated according to Google Scholar), which was 0.3. The main reason for the decrease is the increased frequency of publishing to clear a backlog. The impact factor can be expected to improve with on-time publication and recognition through indexing.
One of the main concerns regarding the journal was the indexing status, which has now markedly improved. With a well-established journal process that has evolved with time, we are now strongly positioned to apply for higher level indexing. The applications for DOAJ and SCOPUS are now under preparation. Having fulfilled the requirements regarding quality, process and timing, the challenges which are mainly technical such as obtaining Digital Object Identifiers (DOI), archiving, and meta tagging, can be readily addressed.
In keeping with SEARAME's objective of providing a platform for researchers and medical educationists in the SEAR region, we have adhered to a very strong open access policy. This stance will be a strong factor in achieving higher status.

Conclusion
SEAJME has now firmly established its due place as the apex medical education journal of the SEAR. We are steadily and gradually moving towards becoming a leading international medical education journal. SEAJME has overcome many challenges though hard work, perseverance and dedication of the Editorial team and the support provided by the Executive Committee and the Secretariat of the SEARAME. Hard earned achievements need to be consolidated and further improvements have to be made in a stepwise and methodical manner.