Since January 1999, the eJIFCC has replaced the paper version. This is the third issue in the new format, and we hope that IFCC members and readers are familiar with this new form of distribution, and continue to find the journal useful.

We chose not to change the style and layout in the first year, but intend to make the changes that you, our readership, feel are appropriate to the content of the journal as a forum for education, debate and information in the laboratory medicine of the year 2000. We will try to show what is happening in laboratory medicine, and patient care in general, throughout the world.

The eJIFCC will also contain educational papers, summary recommendations and news originating from the various bodies of the IFCC.

In order to keep the contents current and dynamic, readers are encouraged to send short articles on topics pertinent to healthcare and laboratories today.

We are convinced that each country has one or more laboratory medicine professionals who have played important professional roles in their home-country and perhaps also internationally. We would like to start a series of portraits of these leading figures.

The new format of communication also opens more possibilities for readers to feed back their thoughts on the eJIFCC and its contents. Together we can give a dynamic and interactive dimension to the eJIFCC, now a living part of the IFCC website, that reflects the true virtue of this "virtual" publication. You can contact us by e-mail via the website, register to receive details of the availability of new issues, and make the journal the way you want it to be.