Medical Journals

Medical journals arepublications that report medical information to physicians and other healthprofessionals.

In the past,thesejournals were available only in print. With the development of electronicpublishing,many medical journals now have Web sites on the Internet,and some

journals arepub-lished only online.A few medical journals,like the Journal of the AmericanMedical Associa-tion,are considered general medical journals because they cover

many fields ofmedicine.Most medical journals are specialty journals that focus on aparticular area of medicine.

Medical journalspublish many types of articles.Research articles report the results of re-searchstudies on a range of topics varying from the basic mechanisms of diseases to

clinical trials thatcompare outcomes of different treatments.Review articles summarize and analyzethe informa-tion available on a specific topic based on a careful search of

the medicalliterature.Because the results of individual research studies can be affectedby many factors,combining results from dif-ferent studies on the same topic canbe

helpful in reachingconclusions about the scientific evidence for preventing,diagnosing or treatinga particular disease.Case conferences and case reports may be published in

medical journals toeducate physicians about particular illnesses and how to treat them. Editorialsin medical journals are short essays that express the views of the authors,of-

ten regarding aresearch or review article published in the same issue.Editorials provide aper-spective on how the current article fits with other information on the same

topic .Letters tothe edi-tor provide a way for readers of the medical journal to expresscomments,questions or criticisms about articles published in that journal.How many majortypes of articles are mentioned in the passage?

A.Five.

B. Seven.

C. Four.

D. Six.