Dear friends and colleagues,

This year we have gotten closer to regaining normal activity at the Journal, after almost three very difficult years of the COVID-19 pandemic. Submissions have slowed a bit, but we still expect to end the year with a higher number of submissions than pre-pandemic. We are receiving an ever-increasing number of submissions from other parts of the world outside of the USA and Europe, and we are determined to help emerging authors from these countries improve their work and publish it. The reach of the Journal continues to grow—in 2021, we had over 1,000,000 electronic article accesses—which shows that we are publishing papers that people are interested in reading.

It was lovely to see friendly faces in Calgary, during the 19th IPNA Congress, without having to use Zoom. Although this is something to celebrate, unfortunately, on a sadder note, last May, we lost Lesley Rees, our dear friend and esteemed colleague, and co-editor-in-chief of Pediatric Nephrology for 12 years. Lesley joined Pediatric Nephrology in this role in 2010 and worked in close collaboration with Michel Baum and, more recently, with Joseph Flynn, when he became co-editor-in-chief in 2021. During her tenure, Lesley did an impressive job in maintaining and further increasing the visibility and impact factor of the Journal, which is now 3.651.

There was obviously the need to fill her position, and we are delighted to announce that Giovanni Montini was appointed as new co-editor-in-chief by the IPNA Council during the Congress in Canada, and he started to work immediately. Giovanni Montini is the holder of the Giuliana and Bernardo Caprotti Chair in Pediatrics at the University of Milan and Director of the Pediatric Nephrology, Dialysis and Transplant Unit of the Foundation IRCCS Ca' Granda Research Institute, Milan. He is an accomplished researcher and lecturer in the field of pediatric nephrology and has published a great body of peer-reviewed articles. Since 2010, he has been part of an international cooperation network project for pediatric nephrology set up in Nicaragua to help underprivileged children with kidney disease gain access to medical care, dialysis, and transplantation.

A major problem we are currently facing is that of finding experienced reviewers, with enough time to dedicate to this vital part of the editorial process, as highlighted during the editorial board meeting in Calgary. There has therefore been a call for young pediatric nephrologists who could support the Journal in reviewing manuscripts. We invite you all to let us know of any possible candidates and their field of expertise. We are waiting in anticipation of receiving your best manuscripts for publication in Pediatric Nephrology.

Season’s greetings to everyone, and here’s hoping that 2023 will be memorable for all the right reasons.

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