Thirty Years of the Journal of Cancer Education: a Review

Since its foundation in 1986, the Journal of Cancer Education (JCE) has served as an important outlet for myriad aspects of cancer education and currently serves as the official journal of the American and European Associations for Cancer Education. During its history, the JCE has been under the auspices of five publishers, with its first full year under the current publisher, Springer, in 2010. Print and distribution metrics from 2010 to present were obtained from Springer. These were compared to historical data including the first 10 years of the JCE, published by Dr. Bakemeier in 1995. Since its beginning, the JCE has consisted of four issues per year. The original contract for 256 pages per year has increased to an average of 858 pages from 2010 to 2014. In 2015, the JCE received a total of 344 submissions, up from 339 in 2014, and 262 the year before. This is a stark contrast to the roughly 44 submission received in 1994. Over this same period, the overall rejection rate has increased from 30% in 2010 to 45% in 2015. The number of online deals has increased from 347 in 2014 to 361 in 2015 and has been accompanied by a steady increase in the number of full-text article downloads: 19,000 in 2010 to 58,923 in 2015. Accordingly, the JCE has seen a pronounced and steady increase in impact factor, rising from 0.52 in 2009 to 1.368 in 2015. Since moving to Springer, the JCE has seen unprecedented growth, receiving increasing submissions yearly, an increasing number of subscription deals and online full-text downloads, and a corresponding increase in impact factor.