Advancing Research in Orofacial Myology and Myofunctional Therapy with a New Publishing Partnership

The International Journal of Orofacial Myology and Myofunctional Therapy (IJOM), the official journal of the International Association of Orofacial Myology (IAOM), has just celebrated its 50th continuous year of publication. For the first 46 years, the title was shorter (International Journal of Oral/Orofacial Myology), and the journal was managed by mail and later by email. It was published in print (ISSN: 0735-0120) and was freely distributed to IAOM members and sold to libraries and other entities through a subscription model. In December 2020, the IJOM underwent a major paradigm shift, expanding its title to reflect the changing nature of the field and becoming an entirely online open-access journal (ISSN: 2694-2526) with no fees for readers or authors (‘diamond’ level open access). The IAOM contracted with an Elsevier online platform, Digital Commons (formerly bepress), to develop and manage the IJOM’s website. The site provided a professional, informative, and functional interface between worldwide authors and readers of orofacial myology and supplied free access to the journal’s entire collection of historic and new content.

Volunteers dedicated to disseminating research on orofacial myology and myofunctional therapy, along with financial support from the IAOM, made it possible for the IJOM to enter the digital world of publishing. We are proud of the journal’s progress and growing reputation. Since launching the IJOM’s website four years ago, over 170,000 articles have been downloaded from more than 5000 institutions across 196 countries or regions. One of our proudest accomplishments was the acceptance of the journal for membership in The Committee for Publication Ethics (COPE) last year. In the acceptance letter, the COPE committee acknowledged that the IJOM’s “level of transparency and commitment to research and publication integrity is high”.

The IJOM is well seated to transition to its next stage of development—partnering with a well-established publisher. We are pleased to formally announce that, with this Editorial, the IJOM is now being published by MDPI [1], the world’s largest fully open-access publisher. MDPI offers the IAOM numerous resources and benefits as part of its “Societies Partnership Model.” This partnership allows the IAOM to retain ownership of the journal while MDPI manages the publication process. The extensive infrastructure and support provided by MDPI will improve the IJOM’s visibility with researchers around the world, expedite scientific review and publication time, and move us towards our indexing goals. We will adopt a ‘gold’ open access model, whereby authors typically pay an article processing charge after an article is accepted for publication, making the research freely available to readers. Authors are encouraged to reach out to the IAOM (info@iaom.com) if such fees cause a barrier to publishing, since we are committed to removing as many barriers to publishing research on orofacial myology and myofunctional therapy as possible.

I am grateful to the highly qualified and dedicated members of the Editorial Board who have selflessly reviewed articles and contributed to the strategic development of the IJOM. With their continued support and our partnership with MDPI, we look forward to a period of increased growth, visibility, and impact.