This same year, in which the Argentine Association of Surgery celebrates its 90th anniversary, celebrating 60 years of uninterrupted scientific publication in Argentina is an event that deserves to be highlighted, even when we are immersed in the current health emergency due to the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic.

This Anniversary Issue of the Argentine Journal of Surgery allows us to compare articles from the first issue with current articles on the same specialty, written ad hoc, and thus be able to estimate the magnitude of the changes that have taken place throughout these years. At the same time, this celebration invites us to reflect upon it. Anniversaries always offer an opportunity to analyze where we come from, how we are today, and where we are going.

The foundational objectives that inspired the creation of the Journal in 1960 -expressed in the first issue as “Objectives and Wishes”- encouraged the smooth circulation of surgical knowledge through a rigorous selection of articles, as well as an educational purpose for authors and readers.

Since then, the ongoing activity of the Journal has allowed us to have a comprehensive record of the work of surgeons in Argentina during the past 60 years, and has turned our publication into an essential source of reference. Recently, the Editorial Committee, made up of associates from different institutions and the secretarial staff, has been introducing changes aimed at modernizing its edition to ensure the quality of the publications.

The articles undergo peer review, external from the Editorial Committee. Likewise, the Journal is quarterly published in electronic format in Spanish and English, with open and free access. It is aimed at facilitating the wide circulation of its content. As a result, the Committee is receiving more and more articles, both from Argentine and foreign authors.

The Journal also publishes conferences, speeches, recommendations from the different Committees and in memoriam articles, with the purpose of spreading the news among the members of the Argentine Association of Surgery and reinforcing their sense of belonging.

The future poses new challenges: to include more comprehensive and -at the same time- more demanding databases with the volume and quality of the contents. As a result of editorial quality policies and strict compliance with regularity and punctuality, in recent years the Journal has managed to rejoin SciELO (Scientific Electronic Library Online), which is the highest indexing at the Ibero-American level.

The Journal is a collective construction that cannot ignore the current time, and its significance will inevitably depend on the support of all. While scientific principles are universal, they should be validated or confronted with the experiences of each region or community.

Therefore, we call upon Argentine and foreign surgeons to continue sending reliable articles of strong methodological rigor. We will also maintain and expand the collaboration of those who act generously as peer reviewers, who are the guardians of the quality of the articles published.

Finally, we believe that in these 60 years of publication, those “Objectives and Wishes” of the Argentine Journal of Surgery founders have been met, and we reaffirm our commitment to continue in the direction of inclusion and growth.