What does the BMJ publish?

The BMJ's mission is to lead the debate on health, and to engage, inform, and stimulate doctors, researchers and other health professionals in ways that will improve outcomes for patients. We aim to help doctors to make better decisions.

To achieve these aims we publish original research articles, review and educational articles, news, letters, investigative journalism, and articles commenting on the clinical, scientific, social, political, and economic factors affecting health. We are delighted to consider articles for publication from doctors and others, and from anywhere in the world.

We can publish only about 7% of the 7000-8000 articles we receive each year, but we aim to give quick and authoritative decisions. For all types of article the average time from submission to first decision is two to three weeks and from acceptance to publication eight to 10 weeks. These times are usually shorter for original research articles. We reject about two thirds of all submissions without sending them for external peer review, but many authors tell us they appreciate quick decisions that allow them to submit their work elsewhere without delay.

We also audit the performance of BMJ research articles, using a wide range of indicators to assess their impact on readers and their dissemination to the wider world.

Open access

The full text of every research article published in the BMJ is immediately accessible on bmj.com through open access, for everyone. The BMJ is committed to keeping research articles Open Access (with Creative Commons licences and deposit of the full text content in PubMedCentral as well as fully Open Access on bmj.com). To support this we are now asking all authors to pay an Open Access fee of £2500 on acceptance of their paper. We do have a waiver policy for authors who cannot pay. Consideration of research articles is not related to ability to pay the fee, and we ask authors not to discuss with editors any issues concerning payment at any stage of the peer review process. Any communications related to fees are handled by administrative staff not involved in decisions about manuscripts.

Research articles, and any other type of article funded by a funder who mandates Open Access publication, are published under a Creative Commons Licence. For non-research articles published with open access we will ask authors to pay the Open Access fee, as explained above.

The BMJ's publication licence allows each author to post their article's URL (provided above) on either their own or their employer's website, thereby giving users free access to the full text of the article on bmj.com. If the article is anything other than a research paper (or other Open Access article) authors will need to use the toll free link to ensure visitors have free access to the article. Alternatively, authors can post the full text of their published article on their own website or their employer's website.

Please see the section of instructions to authors on Copyright, Open Access, and Permission to reuse.

Open peer review

We ask reviewers to sign their reports and declare any competing interests on any manuscripts we send them. Reviewers advise the editors, who make the final decision (aided by an editorial manuscript committee meeting for some articles, including original research).

Who else advises the editors?

The editors receive invaluable support and advice on policy and practice from the BMJ's international advisory board and the BMJ Ethics Committee.

Advice on writing, laying out, and submitting articles

For fully detailed advice please follow the links in the index at the top left of this page. The main points, however, are here:

• Where to submit an article
• How to prepare an article: for all manuscripts
• What to write: advice on preparing the different article types
• How to report research: advice on writing and submitting original research articles
• Is the BMJ the right journal for my research article?
• Policy on all aspects of transparency in conducting research, and in preparing and submitting manuscripts
• BMJ/Cleveland Clinic continuing medical education (CME)
• Responding to articles (rapid responses, letters)
• What will happen to your article: our peer review process
• Our publishing model: The BMJ publishes its articles continuously to bmj.com, so each day there is new content. We then select from among published content to make up a weekly print issue. Each online article has a unique identifier, in place of a page number; this identifier (elocator) should be used when citing any BMJ article. The form of the citation—eg BMJ 2008;337:a134—appears on all articles both online and in print, and it will appear thus in PubMed and other indexes.
• See the frequently asked questions about our publishing model
• Reprints
• Editorial policies and practices: the BMJ follows guidelines on editorial independence produced by the World Association of Medical Editors, the code on good publication practice produced by the Committee on Publication Ethics, and the EQUATOR network resource centre guidance on good research reporting