An actual document detailing the findings and their impact on further research or patient care may not exist. The idea or findings may at this point become accessible to persons outside this limited audience through indexes to meetings and conferences and indexes to proceedings. However, most people searching the literature for information want more detail and often require the further credibility that journal publication provides. Journal publication is the next step in this cycle, and is the point of widest access. Journal articles nearly always present conclusions supported by evidence and a bibliography of previous work on the subject.
Journals also carry commentary in the form of readers' letters and editorials.
They not only provide an outlet for creative work, but a forum for its discussion as well. The contents of journals are indexed by indexing and abstracting services usually specialized to the particular field. It is also here that the original idea is most likely to affect other work. Other reseachers are now free to examine the work and apply it to their own research. The journal article will be cited when its findings affect subsequent work in future publications.