By Chioma Obinna

Nigerian Association of Pharmacists and Pharmaceutical Scientists in the Americas (NAPPSA) has launched a peer-reviewed scientific journal, the American Journal of Pharmacotherapy and Pharmaceutical Sciences (AJPPS).

In a  statement, the journal’s co-founder and chair of the Journal Management Board, Dr Anthony Ikeme,  explained that the journal is a culmination of two years of hard work and core part of the NAPPSA 10-Year Growth Strategy Plan launched in 2020.

“NAPPSA now stands as the very first Nigerian Diasporan professional organization to own her own peer reviewed journal”.

The journal has further reinforced the body’s leadership role and its desire to support global health by enabling the advancement of pharmaceutical practice, sciences and education, particularly in its homeland. It also allows the NAPPSA scientific community the opportunity to help shape the global research agenda.

According to NAPPSA, AJPPS is an open-access peer-reviewed journal committed to publishing high-quality articles in the field of Pharmacotherapy, Public Health, Ethnomedicine, Toxicology, Food Science, Nutrition, Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Sciences.

Speaking on the significance of the milestone while expressing his delight and satisfaction with the feat, Dr Ikeme said NAPPSA has “attained another milestone in its quest to become one of the respected thought leaders in the evolution of pharmacy and pharmaceutical science discipline and an important voice for our community.”

“This is a massive accomplishment that we should be very proud of because AJPPS is not like any other journal.

Any individual or group of individuals can set up a journal, but there is something uniquely special about a professional organization owning a Peer Review Journal and deploying their collective intellectual will to the advancement of their profession.”

The association said the journal, whose editorial board comprises a panel of experts from pharmaceutical science and allied health, has a highly rigorous peer-review process that makes sure that manuscripts are scientifically accurate, relevant, and novel.

The journal will be edited by Patrick Nwakanma, PharmD BCPS Food and Drug Administration Silver Spring, MD and Ashiwel Undieh, PhD, City University of New York School of Medicine, New York, USA.

Ikeme called on members and Nigerian-based pharmaceutical scientists and professionals in related fields “who have the inclination to submit their manuscripts for consideration” for publication in the journal.