History of JBJI

On 20 April 1993, the Study Group was transformed into the "European Bone and Joint Infection Society". Since it seemed valuable to distribute the presentations of the meetings to the members, Geert H. I. M. Walenkamp collected and distributed the collected papers for the first 9 years. From 2007, the proceedings would be published as a supplement in the British volume of the Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery (JBJS-Br), often with the help and editing of Reginald Elson, in that time an active member. Since 2015, the EBJIS has adopted the Bone and Joint Journal (formerly JBJS-Br) as its official journal.

From the earliest years of the Study Group, there was a wish to have a journal of the group dedicated to publications on bone and joint infections. A possibility to realize that was offered in 1994 by the European Journal of Orthopaedic Surgery and Traumatology, by editor Pierre Kehr from Strasbourg. The EBJIS could join two other specialty societies (GECO, SOTEST), both French. On behalf of the EBJIS Günther Lob was a member of a managing committee of 12 surgeons, together with Guy and Jean-Yves Jenny. Heinz Winkler became a co-editor, and 4 EBJIS members participated in the scientific committee of 65 members (Jos Stuyck, Paul Norman, Göran Josefsson, and Alain Lortat-Jacob). After some years, however, it appeared that scarcely any manuscripts were sent by EBJIS members, due to the mainly French orientation of the journal and to the absence of a relevant citation index or PubMed indexation. The cost of the journal subscription was equivalent to 90% of the fee of the EBJIS members, and the society was not able to get industrial sponsorship for these costs. Therefore, the EBJIS decided, in November 1998, to end its participation in this journal. The editor of the journal, Pierre Kehr, was upset, but the decision of the EBJIS general assembly was taken after years of much effort without any progress.