Happy birthday European Heart Journal: in 30 years, from Cinderella to centre stage

‘The European Society of Cardiology is a manifest success’—this is what Desmond G. Julian, as the newly appointed Editor-in-Chief, wrote in his first Editorial in the very first issue of the European Heart Journal that appeared in February 1980.1 He was referring to the tremendous support given by its members to the then 4-yearly (!) Congress of the Society and to the many meetings of the Working Groups—but obviously this was just the beginning of what we experience today. Shortly thereafter, thanks to visionary leaders such as Paul Hugenholtz, Henry Denolin, and others, the European Society of Cardiology grew considerably in the following 30 years—despite the scepticism of many—into one of the most influential and prestigious bodies in medicine. Today, the European Society of Cardiology holds a highly successful annual congress with a growing number of participants, currently >30 000, and its flagship, the European Heart Journal , has turned from a Cinderella of medical literature to centre stage. Over the last three decades, the number of manuscript submissions initially grew slowly, then steadily, and recently markedly from 500 to >3500 a year ( Figure 1A ). Accordingly, the acceptance rate fell from >50% to currently 12%, allowing the selection of the best manuscripts for readers of the journal. As a consequence, the impact factor of the European Heart Journal grew from 1.0 slowly, but then considerably to its current 9.8 ( Figure 1B ). The European Heart Journal now, together with Circulation and the Journal of the American College of Cardiology , belongs to the top three of 95 journals in the field of cardiovascular medicine—what a birthday present! Figure 1 Manuscript submissions ( A ) and impact factor ( B ) of the European Heart Journal over the last 30 years. This success was possible only with the help of dedicated editors and reviewers. After … *Corresponding author. Tel: +41 44 634 55 38, Fax: +41 44 634 55 30, Email: cardiotfl{at}gmx.ch