Do you want to learn more about the publication process? Think you'd like to write an article? Consider attending one of the workshops to be presented by Jay Siwek, M.D., and others at AAFP's Annual Assembly in San Francisco, September 17–20. Dr. Siwek recently helped conduct two workshops presented at the annual spring conference of the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine (STFM), which was held in Chicago. STFM is an organization of over 4,600 family medicine educators.

In one of the sessions, Dr. Siwek joined a “Meet the Editors” forum, which included editors of three research journals, one family practice education journal and one CME journal: Barry Weiss, M.D., editor of Family Medicine; John P. Geyman, M.D., editor of the Journal of the American Board of Family Practice; Marjorie A. Bowman, M.D., M.P.A., editor of Archives of Family Medicine; and Paul A. Nutting, M.D., M.S.P.H., editor of the Journal of Family Practice.

Approximately 50 persons crowded into the session to get a chance to meet these leaders in family medicine. Topics of discussion included which journals publish what types of materials and pointers for submitting manuscripts.

Dr. Siwek also worked with Rosaire Verna, M.D., this year's AFP editorial fellow, to conduct a session called “How to Write and Publish a Clinical Review Article.” Also overcrowded, this workshop covered the process of selecting article topics, conducting a literature search, writing and revising the first draft, submitting the manuscript for publication, and surviving peer review, final revisions and publishing.

Participants completed two exercises: one on topic selection (proposing topics to colleagues and refining them) and another on writing an original abstract for a paper, based on the details presented. The goal of these exercises was to help potential authors achieve clarity of writing and content.