BMJ Group has released its 2025 impact report, emphasizing the organization’s growing role in influencing health systems, clinical practice, and global policy.
As a signatory to the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA), BMJ Group supports a broader assessment of research quality and impact. In addition to reporting Journal Impact Factor, BMJ journals also provide metrics such as CiteScore, Altmetric mentions, and time to first decision. These indicators give institutions, authors, and funders a clearer view of not only how research is cited, but also how quickly it shapes policy, informs debate, and changes practice.
More than half of BMJ Group’s 65-plus journals ranked in the top quartile of their respective fields, and 20 percent placed in the global top ten of their categories. The results point to consistent impact across the portfolio beyond traditional headline metrics.
The report highlights a number of examples where BMJ evidence has influenced healthcare practice and policy. Research published in The BMJ contributed to the UK government’s decision to mandate folic acid fortification of flour, a measure expected to prevent thousands of neural tube defects. A study in BMJ Innovations helped drive the creation of the first device designed to address racial bias in oxygen monitoring, supporting safer diagnostics for patients with all skin tones. BMJ Impact Analytics, meanwhile, was used by the Office of Health Economics to show that 27 percent of its research was cited in policy—four times the global average—supporting funding efforts and demonstrating real-world value.
In BMJ Paediatrics Open, under the editorship of Professor Shanti Raman, a special collection has focused on improving the health and wellbeing of street and working children worldwide. The collection provides practical tools for clinicians and policymakers and highlights the experiences of children whose voices are often overlooked.
BMJ Best Practice has also been adopted nationally in countries including Ireland and Cyprus, where it supports clinical decision-making and patient empowerment. In Cyprus, Professor George Samoutis, chairman of the coordination committee of the National Centre for Clinical Evidence, noted that BMJ Group’s tools and events contribute directly to shaping the country’s approach to evidence-based healthcare.
BMJ Group’s digital tools were another area of focus. Ireland’s Health Service Executive (HSE) has implemented BMJ Best Practice patient leaflets to counter unreliable health information. Over the course of a year, the resources recorded 288,000 sessions and 1.7 million interactions. By providing evidence-based guidance, the leaflets give patients clear information, help build trust, and support shared decision-making between patients and clinicians. Brendan Leen, area library manager at the HSE Library, highlighted that the universal availability of these resources improves conversations between healthcare professionals and patients and strengthens decisions around treatment and lifestyle choices.
BMJ Group stated that the findings in the report demonstrate the broader effects of its work, showing how research can generate real-world outcomes that strengthen health systems and improve patient care worldwide.
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