On June 18th, 2025, the 2025 Journal Citation Reports with journal impact factors (IFs) were released by the Clarivate Analytics. This time, about 22 000 journals from 111 countries, including 5800 open‑access titles, were evaluated and received unified rankings across subject categories. For the first time, citations to and from retracted or withdrawn articles, the number of which is rising steadily, were not included in the calculation of 2024 IFs, representing a much‑needed step to endorse research integrity. The latest 2‑year IF has been calculated by dividing all citations from a given journal within 2024 by the number of so‑called citable items encompassing mainly original articles and reviews published in a given journal during the 2 preceding years (this time in 2022 and 2023).

The 2024 IF calculated for Polish Archives of Internal Medicine (Pol Arch Intern Med) has increased by 0.9, as compared with its value from the last year, reaching 4.7, which is a huge success (Figure 1). Pol Arch Intern Med is in the top quartile in the General medicine category, which proves the quality of the research published in our journal, and indirectly a great potential for Polish internal medicine, since the majority of papers that generated the 2024 IF were submitted by Polish clinicians. Pol Arch Intern Med remains the top Polish clinical journal (Table 1) and despite its long history of impressive 103 years, the flagship journal of the Polish Society of Internal Medicine thrives and is likely to grow further. Since the latest IF markedly influences an author’s choice of where to publish their manuscripts, we hope that more and more high‑quality papers will be submitted to Pol Arch Intern Med. Another favorable change from 2024 is universal adoption of gold open access model under the CC‑BY license for all manuscripts published in our journal.

The major contributors to the latest IF, namely the most cited articles from 2022 and 2023 are listed in Table 2. The scientists who most frequently cited the articles from Pol Arch Intern Med in 2024 are provided in Table 3, and our most active reviewers are listed in Table 4. We do appreciate significance of their impact on enhancing the standing of our journal.

However, I would like to thank you all—every author and reviewer—for your invaluable contribution to the journal’s success. Special thanks go to the editorial board members, professor Grzegorz Gajos, professor Tomasz Stompór, together with the Polish and International Scientific Boards headed by professor Andrzej Januszewicz and Professor Roman Jaeschke, respectively. It should be highlighted that since March 1, 2025, our new social media editor Anna Imiela, MD, PhD, a young cardiologist, invigorated and reshaped our presence on Facebook and X targeting medical students and younger scientists, the future of internal medicine; within 3 months the number of our followers on Facebook for instance increased by about 20%. We look forward to expanding our reach in the following months.

As of September 1, 2025, all newly submitted manuscripts will be charged higher publication fees, that is, 1200 EUR for a full‑length original article, 1000 EUR for uninvited review, 600 EUR for a research letter, and 800 EUR for a clinical image. This decision has been made taking into account growing staff costs to keep the highest publishing standards, with no financial support from the government for national journals in 2025.

We continue to do all what we can to choose wisely the best, innovative and methodologically sound studies and to build the journal’s reputation and prestige in the highly competitive scientific market. Our goal is that the 2025 IF of Pol Arch Intern Med surpasses the current value and reaches 5.0. We do hope that the joint efforts of the authors, reviewers, and our “Wunderteam” of editors, along with the publisher’s expertise, reflected by the dedicated work of our Managing Editor, Ms. Katarzyna Toffel, will let us achieve this value in June 2026. As in previous years, we sincerely encourage you to submit your high‑quality research to Pol Arch Intern Med, accept our invitations to write review articles, and finally to join us on social media.