Best General Health Professions Journals (2026)
Paste your title and abstract to get 5 realistic matches from verified biomedical journals — every publisher, no predatory journals, and your abstract is never stored.
Type your field and pick it to see the top-ranked journals — every journal listed is indexed in PubMed, DOAJ, or a curated core source list.
Top General Health Professions journals
| # | Journal | h-index | Citations/paper (2 yr) | Tier | Access | Indexed in |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | New England Journal of Medicine Massachusetts Medical Society | 1509 | 30.09 | Flagship | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 2 | Annual Review of Public Health Annual Reviews | 242 | 12.93 | Flagship | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 3 | Implementation Science BioMed Central | 207 | 10.65 | Leading field journal | Open access · APC $3,190 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 4 | JAMA Network Open American Medical Association | 235 | 9.16 | Leading field journal | Open access · APC $3,000 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 5 | JAMA American Medical Association | 1013 | 8.84 | Flagship | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 6 | Journal of Medical Internet Research JMIR Publications | 295 | 8.15 | Leading field journal | Open access · APC $2,950 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 7 | Preventing Chronic Disease Centers for Disease Control and Prevention | 100 | 7.97 | Leading field journal | Open access · APC — | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 8 | JAMA Internal Medicine American Medical Association | 260 | 7.03 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 9 | International Journal of Nursing Studies Elsevier BV | 213 | 5.79 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 10 | Systematic Reviews BioMed Central | 140 | 5.53 | Leading field journal | Open access · APC $2,790 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 11 | BMC Nursing BioMed Central | 98 | 5.19 | Leading field journal | Open access · APC $2,690 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 12 | JMIR mhealth and uhealth JMIR Publications | 158 | 4.94 | Leading field journal | Open access · APC $2,850 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 13 | International Journal for Equity in Health BioMed Central | 136 | 4.89 | Leading field journal | Open access · APC $3,190 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 14 | BMC Public Health BioMed Central | 291 | 4.47 | Leading field journal | Open access · APC $2,990 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 15 | Health Research Policy and Systems BioMed Central | 109 | 4.35 | Leading field journal | Open access · APC $3,090 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 16 | Health Promotion International Oxford University Press | 146 | 4.33 | Leading field journal | Open access · APC $4,655 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 17 | BMJ | 414 | 4.3 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 18 | BMJ Quality & Safety BMJ | 222 | 4.3 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 19 | Journal of Nursing Scholarship Wiley | 143 | 3.75 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 20 | Journal of Advanced Nursing Wiley | 263 | 3.68 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 21 | BMC Health Services Research BioMed Central | 219 | 3.67 | Leading field journal | Open access · APC $2,990 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 22 | Bulletin of the World Health Organization World Health Organization | 201 | 3.58 | Solid specialist | Open access · APC — | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 23 | Nursing Ethics SAGE Publishing | 115 | 3.53 | Solid specialist | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 24 | Qualitative Health Research SAGE Publishing | 188 | 3.44 | Solid specialist | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 25 | Journal of Nursing Management Wiley | 143 | 3.37 | Solid specialist | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 26 | International Journal of Public Health Springer Science+Business Media | 101 | 3.35 | Solid specialist | Open access · APC No APC | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 27 | BMC Family Practice Springer Science+Business Media | 130 | 3.3 | Solid specialist | Open access · APC $2,690 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 28 | Healthcare Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute | 117 | 3.3 | Solid specialist | Open access · APC $2,227 | PubMed · Core |
| 29 | Journal of Clinical Nursing Wiley | 173 | 3.27 | Solid specialist | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 30 | Health Expectations Wiley | 132 | 3.15 | Solid specialist | Open access · APC $3,630 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
Frequently asked questions
How does the journal finder work?+
You paste your title and abstract; an AI model classifies the paper into biomedical subfields and honestly assesses its scope, then ranks a shortlist of verified journals from our dataset of 2,600+ biomedical journals. Every metric shown comes from the dataset — the AI can never invent a journal or a number.
Is it free?+
Yes — free, no signup, no hidden trial. There's a fair-use limit of 15 matches per day. Browsing ranked journals by field is unlimited.
How is this different from JANE or the Elsevier Journal Finder?+
Publisher tools like Elsevier's, Springer's, or Wiley's finders only recommend their own journals. JANE is cross-publisher but hasn't changed since 2007 and can surface journals of unverified quality from PubMed. This finder is cross-publisher, only shows journals verified in trusted indexes, and calibrates recommendations to your paper's realistic tier.
How do you keep predatory journals out?+
By construction: every journal in our dataset must be indexed in DOAJ, PubMed, or a curated core source list, with a real citation record. Journals with no verified quality signals simply never appear — we don't maintain accusatory blacklists.
Is my abstract stored or used to train AI?+
No. Your abstract is processed to generate recommendations and is not stored, logged, or used for model training. We know unpublished work is sensitive.
Which fields are covered?+
All of biomedicine and the life sciences: 38 subfields from molecular biology, immunology, and oncology to public health, pharmacology, neuroscience, plant science, and veterinary medicine.
Why don't you show impact factors?+
The Journal Impact Factor is proprietary to Clarivate and requires a paid license. We show open, verifiable alternatives instead: h-index and 2-year citations per paper from OpenAlex, plus each journal's percentile within its own field — which is more informative for comparing journals in the same specialty.
Where does the data come from?+
From open, verifiable sources: OpenAlex (CC0) for citation metrics, the U.S. National Library of Medicine's PubMed journal list, and the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ). Publishing in the wrong venue has real consequences — in 2019 a U.S. federal court ordered the publisher OMICS Group to pay $50.1 million for deceptive peer-review claims. When in doubt about any journal, use the Think. Check. Submit. checklist at thinkchecksubmit.org.
How do I find top-quartile journals in my field?+
Use the browse section: pick your subfield and the table ranks journals by 2-year citations per paper. Tier 1–2 journals roughly correspond to the top quartile of a field. Each row shows open-access status, publication fees (APC), and which trusted indexes list the journal.
See the actual papers these journals publish
Waffoo Search runs AI-powered literature discovery across 30+ biomedical databases — free.
Try Waffoo SearchData: OpenAlex (CC0) · U.S. National Library of Medicine · DOAJ. Quality signals are informational, refreshed periodically, and are not an endorsement or judgment about any journal; no endorsement by NLM/NIH is implied. Spotted an error? Contact us and we'll review it.

