British Medical Bulletin

The British Medical Bulletin (commonly abbreviated as '''''BMB'') is a peer-reviewed academic journal published by Oxford University Press, appearing quarterly online. Each issue is a themed supplement and all articles are commissioned by the editorial board《英国医学公报》（British Medical Bulletin'，常用缩写为 BMB）是牛津大学出版社出版的同行评审学术期刊，每季出版一期，线上发行。该刊每期为一个主题专辑，全部文章均为编委会约稿，不接收未经约稿的投稿；面向全科医师、住院医师与医学生的跨学科综述。 unsolicited submissions are not accepted. It publishes multidisciplinary reviews for generalist physicians, junior doctors and medical students.

Scope

The journal states three connected aims: to publish high quality reviews in a multidisciplinary forum for generalist physicians, junior doctors and medical students in both developed and developing countries本刊的官方定位有三层：一是跨学科发表高质量综述，读者为发达国家与发展中国家的全科医师、住院医师与医学生；二是由本领域可信专家解释医学中正在成长的方向，并帮助执业者不仅把证据、更把新的思考方式纳入自己的实践；三是全部已刊综述均由编委会约稿，不接收未经约稿的投稿。三层定位合起来说明本刊的工作模式是编辑部主动组织一个主题、邀请该领域的可信专家分别撰写不同侧面，其产出是一册围绕一个问题的多角度综述集。收文覆盖的主要方向包括： to provide interpretations of growing points in medicine by trusted experts in the field and to assist practitioners in incorporating not just evidence but new conceptual ways of thinking into their practice. Together these describe a mode of work in which the editors organize a theme, commission trusted specialists to write its different aspects, and the issue emerges as a multi-angle review set around one question. Its principal subject areas include:^[1]

• Translational medicine and mechanism: new understandings of disease mechanism, molecular and cellular processes of pathogenesis, and the relation between animal models and human disease.转化医学与机制研究： 疾病机制的新认识、分子与细胞层面的致病过程、动物模型与人类疾病的关系。

• Epidemiology and public health: disease burden and risk factors, population-level intervention and prevention, and health services research.流行病学与公共卫生： 疾病负担与风险因素、人群干预与预防策略、健康服务研究。

• Clinical management: management pathways for specific diseases, diagnostic techniques, treatment options, and clinical trial results.临床诊疗： 特定疾病的管理路径、诊断技术、治疗选择与临床试验结果。

• Medical education and ethics: methods in medical education, the professional formation of physicians, and medical ethics and regulation.医学教育与伦理学： 医学教育方法、医师职业素养、医学伦理学与法规。

• Health systems and policy: the organization and financing of health systems, access to care, and international health governance.卫生体系与政策： 卫生体系的组织与筹资、医疗可及性、国际卫生治理。

• History of medicine and the literature: the history of medical thought, the history of major diseases, and reassessment of key texts.医学史与文献： 医学思想史、重大疾病的历史、关键文献的重新评估。

The journal is quarterly, became online-only from 2020, and is hybrid, with authors choosing between a standard licence and an open access licence. Published articles enter the Oxford Journals Archive, which reaches back to the founding issue of 1943. The official metrics page reports a 2025 impact factor of 7.5 and a five-year factor of 12.6, placing the journal twenty-seventh by impact factor among 336 titles in general and internal medicine in the Journal Citation Reports本刊为季刊，自二〇二〇年起为纯线上形态，属混合出版，作者可在标准许可与开放获取许可之间选择。论文出版后进入牛津期刊档案库，可回溯至一九四三年创刊号。官方指标页显示，本刊二〇二五年影响因子 7.5、五年影响因子 12.6，在期刊引证报告的普通内科学类 336 种期刊中按影响因子列第二十七位；同年斯科普斯引用分数 11.4，在全部医学类中列第二十八位。出版社未公布录用比例与首决时长——对一份全部约稿的刊物而言这两项指标本不适用。 the 2025 Scopus CiteScore is 11.4, twenty-eighth across medicine as a whole. The publisher publishes neither an acceptance rate nor a time to first decision, neither being meaningful for a wholly commissioned journal.^[1]

History

• The proposal (1940): the idea for the journal took shape in the summer of 1940, agreed among representatives of the British Medical Association, the British Council, the Medical Research Council and the Ministry of Information, and initially funded by the Information Ministry. Norman Howard-Jones, its first editor, recorded the process in a history he published in the BMJ in 1977. That account also explains that despite the title, the publishing entity was not the BMJ: the latter supplied premises and personnel in the early period, with its deputy editor Hugh Clegg in charge.创刊动议（1940年）： 本刊的构想始于 1940 年夏，由三方协商促成：英国医学会、英国文化委员会、医学研究委员会与新闻信息部四方代表参与，最初由信息部出资。首任编辑诺曼·霍华德-琼斯在其 1977 年发表于《英国医学杂志》的社史文章中记述了这一过程，并说明刊名虽带「英国医学」，实际出版实体并非《英国医学杂志》——后者只是提供了场地与人员平台，早期由其副主编休·克莱格主持。^[2]

• Founding (1943): the first issue appeared in March 1943, published by the British Council, which the catalogue records as the issuing body. The early arrangement had Churchill Livingstone printing for the British Council, with the Oxford University Press later taking over the printing on the Council's behalf. The official fiftieth-anniversary account states the founding rationale directly: the British Council established it to promote medical science abroad.创刊（1943年）： 首期于 1943 年 3 月出版，由英国文化委员会出版，编目记录亦明确记其为出版实体。早期的安排是英国文化委员会作为出版方，由查士维利·利文斯顿为其印制，后来改由牛津大学出版社为英国文化委员会出版。官方五十周年史对创刊动机的表述是：由英国文化委员会创办，以在海外推广医学科学。^[3]

• Establishment of the format (1943–1953): the first issue was a miscellaneous collection of abstracts, which gave way issue by issue to a single theme形态的确立（1943—1953年）： 创刊首期是一份内容杂凑的文摘集，其后逐期转为单一主题；到第 4 卷即 1946 至 1947 年间，今日的形态确立——取消文摘，改为精心策划的主题综述专辑；1953 年取消了原来的评论、历史与文献部分，即第二部分。首任编辑的记述按年连续，无中断迹象，「创刊后曾短暂停刊」一说不成立。 by volume 4, that is 1946 to 1947, the present form was established, abstracts being dropped in favour of carefully planned thematic review supplements in 1953 the second part, which had carried comments, history and literature, was abolished. The founding editor's account runs year by year without interruption, so the claim that the journal ceased for a time after founding does not hold.^[2]

• Publisher transition (1996): the Oxford University Press has published the journal since volume 52, that is from 1996, after which the National Library of Medicine's catalogue lists the press as the formal publisher from 2001. The two are not in conflict, the first being when publication began and the second when the attribution became formal. Two years should be recorded side by side on the print edition: the catalogue states that print issues ceased in 2014, while the publisher's own page describes the journal as online-only from 2020.出版方移交（1996年）： 牛津大学出版社自第 52 卷即 1996 年起为本刊出版，其后美国国立医学图书馆的编目把正式出版方自 2001 年起列为牛津大学出版社；两者并不矛盾，前者是开始出版的时点，后者是正式列名的时点。纸本方面存在两个需要并列记录的年份：编目记录称纸本在 2014 年停刊，出版社官方页面则称自 2020 年起转为纯线上。^[4]

• Change of volume structure (2001): from volume 57 in 2001 each number is one volume and four volumes are issued a year, a scheme different from the earlier one. Measurement of the current numbering shows recent years carrying a single issue per volume with continuously advancing volume numbers.卷期改制（2001年）： 自 2001 年第 57 卷起，每一「期」即为一「卷」，每年出四卷，与此前的编号方式不同。现行卷期编号实测显示近年为每卷一个期次，卷号连续递增。^[5]

Editors

The journal is edited by an editor-in-chief, supported by an editorial advisory board of four and commissioning editors numbering some twenty-seven. That staffing matches a journal in which nothing arrives by submission: the practical work of the editorial office is maintaining a sufficiently broad network of experts willing to be commissioned, and assembling an issue from that network theme by theme. The publisher publishes neither an acceptance rate nor a time to first decision, since neither applies here.本刊实行主编统筹，另设顾问编委会四位与约稿编委约二十七位。这一人员配置与本刊全部约稿的制度相配：既然稿件不来自投稿，编辑部的实际工作就是维护一个足够广且愿意应约的专家网络，再按主题从网络中组稿。出版社未公布录用比例与首决时长，因为二者对本刊不适用。^[6]

• Nicola Maffulli (editor-in-chief since 2024): a professor at Queen Mary University of London, with further appointments at the Sapienza University of Rome and the University of Kiel. He took office through a public statement published in volume 151, number 1 of September 2024, the first issue of the journal to carry his name. In it he noted that his predecessor Norman Vetter had led the journal for nearly two decades and had left a handpicked editorial board in place.尼古拉·马福利（2024年起任）： 玛丽女王大学教授，并在罗马的萨皮恩扎大学与德国基尔大学另有任职。他是本刊首位以公开声明方式就任的主编：其上任声明载于 2024 年 9 月的第 151 卷第 1 期，即本刊首期以其名义出版的期刊。他在该声明中说明前任诺曼·韦特领导本刊近二十年，并留下了一位亲自遴选的编委。^[7]

• D. Norman Vetter (predecessor): a professor at Cardiff University who led the journal for nearly two decades until his death in 2024. His long tenure covered the journal's transition from print to fully online, and after his departure it announced a move to continuous publication and a willingness to consider accepting original research, a substantive change in a journal over eighty years old.诺曼·韦特（前任）： 加的夫大学教授，领导本刊近二十年，至 2024 年逝世。他的长期任职恰逢本刊从纸本走向完全线上的过渡期，其离任后本刊宣布转向连续出版，并开始考虑接收原创研究——这是本刊八十余年来体裁上的一次实质变动。^[7]

• Founding editor: Norman Howard-Jones was both the practical founder of the journal and its first editor, and wrote the retrospective history of the title himself in 1977, which makes him the source for much of what is known about its founding.创刊主编： 诺曼·霍华德-琼斯是本刊的实际创办者与首任编辑，他以创办者身份于 1977 年亲自撰写了刊史回顾，因此本刊的创刊细节多出自其本人之手。^[2]

• The editorial office and contact: the publisher's board page also names Shirley Letts as the editorial office contact, at bmb.editorialoffice@paeditorial.co.uk, a change from the publisher's own domain address used in earlier years and consequent on the editorial office being outsourced.编辑部与联系方式： 官方编委页面另载编辑部联系人为雪莉·莱茨，其联系邮箱为 bmb.editorialoffice@paeditorial.co.uk，与早年使用的出版社域名邮箱不同，属编辑部外包后的变更。^[6]

• Standing in the field: the stated readership of generalist physicians, junior doctors and medical students, rather than specialists, determines that its themed supplements must be clinically usable and not merely deep. The reach of the archive, whose content runs back to the founding issue of 1943 and remains searchable, is also unusual among medical titles.学科地位： 本刊的读者定位明确指向全科医师、住院医师与医学生，而非专科研究者，这决定了其主题专辑在深度之外还须具备临床可用性；其一九四三年创刊号至今仍可在出版社的期刊档案库中检索，这在医学类刊物中属罕见的档案完整度。^[1]