I am a retired professor of the Medical University of Graz, Austria, and the main foci of my scientific work were hepatobiliary surgery and surgical endoscopy. My profile comprises numerous publications in scientific journals, book contributions (e.g., Sabiston’s Textbook of Surgery, 16th ed., as well as in books on liver surgery, acute abdomen, etc.), and congress presentations, but – in this context – I would like to emphasize that they were teamwork. Apart from my surgical career, I have always been very fond of teaching and discussing research findings and scientific developments in a collegial atmosphere. I was honored to serve as an invited faculty member and chairman of scientific sessions at numerous international (e.g., Washington, Istanbul, Beijing, Amsterdam, Tokyo, Moscow, Athens, Paris, Bangkok, Seoul etc.) and national congresses. However, due to health reasons, I have ceased long-distance traveling. I also acted as Honorary Professor of the International School of Surgical Oncology, as President of the Austrian Society of Surgical Research, etc., and was an editorial board member/section editor/consultant/reviewer/invited commentator of multiple journals, scientific organizations, ethics committees and research funds. My cooperation with the WJG has started very long ago and it is a pleasure for me to be a longstanding Editorial Board Member having reviewed more than 330 manuscripts for the WJG and for related journals. In my personal experience as an author, I always found good reviews extraordinarily helpful and significantly contributing to the quality of the final paper. In my opinion, it is important to distinguish between review and invited commentary. As a reviewer, I aim at specifically committing myself to crucial items of the manuscript and to suggestions for the authors, whereas invited commentaries may cover the subject in a broader sense. I consider reviewing as a voluntary and non-paid task of every scientist; reviewing good manuscripts is also very rewarding for myself and I do hope that my reviews are helping both the journal and the authors.