American Journal of Preventive Medicine Impact Factor Reaches New High

The American Journal of Preventive Medicine, official journal of APTR and the American College of Preventive Medicine (ACPM), has achieved a 2021 Impact Factor of 6.604. Impact Factor is a numerical representation of a journal’s scholarly impact, calculated based on the number of citations in a given year of content published in the previous 2 years.

The 2021 Impact Factor represents an increase of more than 1.5 points from the previous year and is the highest in the journal’s 37-year history. AJPM’s rapidly rising Impact Factor has occurred in tandem with a marked increase in submissions since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, with more than 2,000 articles submitted each in 2020 and 2021—a 23% increase over the average number of submissions the previous 5 years.

Achieving an Impact Factor over 5.00—the mark of a “high impact” journal and a figure that was first surpassed by AJPM in 2020—has been a goal of Editor-in-Chief Dr. Matthew L. Boulton and his editorial team since he assumed leadership of the journal in 2014. During his tenure, the journal has also undertaken other major initiatives including creating a digital archive of previously print-only material from 1985–1997; implementing special initiatives such as the Article of the Year and From the Archive features; redesigning the cover, website, and branding; markedly increasing social media and other outreach activity; playing a key role in launching an affiliated journal, AJPM Focus; and working closely with the sponsoring societies on conference presentations and the more regular publication of society content in the journal. The AJPM editorial team looks forward to capitalizing on the journal’s momentum to achieve even greater scholarly impact and reach in the future.