To celebrate the launch of Cases Database, BioMed Central is offering a discounted article processing charge to Journal of Medical Case Reports authors, and expanding the scope of its Case Report of the Year Award.

Creating Cases Database, BioMed Central’s freely accessible database of peer-reviewed case reports which launched last month, was one of the original aims of Journal of Medical Case Reports. The expertise and guidance of a number of the journal’s senior editorial board members, including in particular Editor-in-Chief Prof Michael Kidd and Deputy Editor Dr Geoff Wong, have been invaluable in developing the database.

Cases Database is growing rapidly and includes several thousand more case reports than when it first launched in December 2012. It currently includes nearly 20,000 case reports from 170 journals. All case reports, more than 2,500, published in Journal of Medical Case Reports are included in Cases Database.

Journal of Medical Case Reports is offering a 20% discount on the article processing charge to Cases Database users who submit a case report to Journal of Medical Case Reports before March 1st 2013. When submitting a manuscript, authors should request a discretionary discount during the submission process, quoting discount code CASESDB2013.

Nominations for BioMed Central’s 2012 Case Report of the Year Award close soon. This award has previously recognized the most original and significant, to clinical practice, case report published in Journal of Medical Case Reports. Journal of Medical Case Reports’ focus on important original case reports which expand the field of general medical knowledge has produced winners from across medicine, including in ophthalmology, and a case series of the application of stem cell therapy. Given the value of case reports is increased when multiple sources are considered, the scope of the Case Report of the Year Award has been extended, for this and subsequent years, to include all journals publishing case reports at BioMed Central. This includes many of the BMC series journals and our independent titles which are contributing thousands of case reports to Cases Database. Nominations, which should be submitted online, are also now open publicly, and will be judged by Prof Michael Kidd. Please identify your nominees for the 2012 award by 31st January 2013 for them to be considered – and perhaps a search of Cases Database might help in finding them.