Heart (journal)


Heart is a biweekly peer-reviewed medical journal covering all areas of cardiovascular medicine and surgery. It is the official journal of the British Cardiovascular Society. It was established in 1939 as the British Heart Journal and is published by the BMJ Group. The name was changed from British Heart Journal to Heart in 1996 with the start of volume 75.
Topics covered include coronary disease, electrophysiology, valve disease, imaging techniques, congenital heart disease, heart failure, surgery, and basic science. Each issue also contains an extensive continuing professional education section.
The journal is available online by subscription, with archives from before 2006 accessible free of charge. The editor-in-chief is Catherine Otto.
In 2010, Heart launched a sister journal, Heart Asia. As the official journal of the Asia Pacific Heart Association, Heart Asia aimed to focus on cardiovascular research in the Asia Pacific region. A second sister journal, Open Heart, was launched in 2010 with the aim of covering high quality cardiovascular research with less emphasis on novelty or priority.

Abstracting and indexing

The journal is abstracted and indexed by Index Medicus, Science Citation Index, EMBASE, Google Scholar and Scopus. According to the Journal Citation Reports, its 2017 impact factor is 5.420, ranking it 22nd out of 128 journals in the category "Cardiac and Cardiovascular Systems".

Editors-in-chief

The following persons have been editor-in-chief of the journal:
According to Scopus, the following three articles from Heart have been cited most often :
Day, C. et al. QT dispersion: an indication of arrhythmia risk in patients with long QT intervals. British Heart Journal 63 :342-344
Jenni, R. et al. Echocardiographic and pathoanatomical characteristics of isolated left ventricular non-compaction: a step towards classification as a distinct cardiomyopathy. Heart 86 :666-671
Wilkins, G.T. et al. Percutaneous balloon dilatation of the mitral valve: an analysis of echocardiographic variables related to outcome and the mechanism of dilatation. British Heart Journal. 60 :299-308