Journal profile · PUBLIC, ENVIRONMENTAL & OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH
International Journal of Health Geographics
ISSN 1476-072X · BioMed Central · ENGLAND · Founded 2002
International Journal of Health Geographics: CAS Zone 3 · Medicine (2025 upgraded edition); impact factor 4.08; fully open access; APC about USD 3,390; median 158 days to acceptance (103 articles, last 24 months); 57 articles in 2025; indexed in SCIE, SSCI and Scopus.
Scope
Aims, scope and focus
International Journal of Health Geographics is published by BioMed Central and is in Zone 3 of Medicine in the CAS Journal Ranking (2025 upgraded edition). By OpenAlex counts of its recent articles, its largest topics are Data-Driven Disease Surveillance, Urban Transport and Accessibility and Health disparities and outcomes, together about 38.3% of its articles. (generated from OpenAlex topic counts and CAS ranking data)
International Journal of Health Geographics is fully dedicated to publishing novel, high quality and internationally significant manuscripts on all aspects of geospatial information systems and science applications in health and healthcare. International Journal of Health Geographics covers a wide range of interdisciplinary geospatial topics in a health/healthcare context, from spatial data infrastructure and Web geospatial interoperability research, to research into real-time Geographic Information Systems (GIS)-enabled surveillance services, remote sensing applications, spatial epidemiology, spatio-temporal statistics, internet GIS and cyberspace mapping, participatory GIS and citizen sensing, geospatial big data, healthy smart cities and regions, and geospatial Internet of Things and blockchain. The journal is thus of interest to audiences from many different fields.
From the journal's Aims & Scope
Research area (LetPub): PUBLIC, ENVIRONMENTAL & OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH
Editor-in-chief Maged NabihPublisher website
Editorial board by country: 6 in mainland China (about 14%); most named United States 18, Mainland China 6, United Kingdom 4, Canada 2, Hong Kong, China 1 (43 members with a country) Editorial board ↗Publisher website ·
Main research topics OpenAlex counts of recent articles; shares are approximate
- Data-Driven Disease SurveillanceMedicine19.6%
- Urban Transport and AccessibilitySocial Sciences11.9%
- Health disparities and outcomesSocial Sciences6.7%
- COVID-19 epidemiological studiesMathematics6.5%
- Spatial and Panel Data AnalysisEconomics, Econometrics and Finance6.3%
- Mosquito-borne diseases and controlMedicine5.4%
- Urban Green Space and HealthEnvironmental Science5%
- Malaria Research and ControlMedicine3.6%
Rankings & indexing
CAS ranking and database indexing
CAS Journal Ranking
CAS Journal Ranking, upgraded edition (March 2025)Medicine Zone 3
| Level | Category | Zone |
|---|---|---|
| Major | Medicine | Zone 3 |
| Minor | Public, Environmental & Occupational Health | Zone 3 |
Top journal: noReview journal: no
CAS Xinrui Journal Ranking (March 2026)Medicine Zone 2
| Level | Category | Zone |
|---|---|---|
| Major | Medicine | Zone 2 |
| Minor | Public, Environmental & Occupational Health | Zone 2 |
Top journal: noReview journal: not marked
CAS Journal Ranking, previous upgraded edition (December 2023)Medicine Zone 2
| Level | Category | Zone |
|---|---|---|
| Major | Medicine | Zone 2 |
| Minor | Public, Environmental & Occupational Health | Zone 2 |
Top journal: noReview journal: no
Database indexing
SCIESSCIScopusDOAJLetPub
International journal early-warning lists: not listed in any editionLetPub
Indexing the journal's website claims
MEDLINECASCAB AbstractsPublisher website
Other: Google Scholar, ProQuest, Dimensions, CNKI, Baidu, Naver, OCLC, Portico, CLOCKSS, Semantic Scholar
As the journal's website lists them, not checked against each database; for Web of Science editions the records above apply.
Editions, and major and minor categories, are shown separately and never merged into one zone; check which edition your institution uses before you submit or report.
Metrics
Impact metrics and publication volume
Impact
- Impact factor
- 4.08LetPub ·
- Impact factor (publisher) 2025
- 4.1Publisher website ·
- 5-year impact factor (publisher) 2025
- 4.4Publisher website ·
- CiteScore 2026-06
- 4.8LetPub ·
- SJR 2026-06
- 0.95LetPub ·
- SNIP 2026-06
- 1.19LetPub ·
- h-index
- 62LetPub ·
- h-index
- 118OpenAlex ·
- i10-index
- 913OpenAlex ·
- 2-year mean citedness
- 3.21OpenAlex ·
- Self-citation rate
- 2.4%LetPub ·
- Share of gold OA articles
- 100%LetPub ·
Volume
- Articles per year
- 56LetPub ·
- Articles per year (publisher)
- 2,025Publisher website ·
- Downloads per year (publisher) 2025
- 1,000,000Publisher website ·
Articles by year OpenAlex count · 1,137 in total · the current year is incomplete
| Year | Articles | Open access | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | 51 | 51 | 12 |
| 2025 | 57 | 57 | 150 |
| 2024 | 27 | 27 | 271 |
| 2023 | 38 | 38 | 538 |
| 2022 | 22 | 22 | 339 |
| 2021 | 46 | 46 | 1,167 |
Sources count differently and were observed at different times, so each source's own value is kept; "publisher" marks figures from the journal's website.
Review & acceptance
Review time and acceptance
Review time from article dates manuscript dates registered with Crossref · to
158 daysMedian, submission to acceptance · P25–P75 115 days – 222 days
- Acceptance to online
- median 21 days (103 articles)
- Submission to online
- median 180 days
- Sample
- 103 articles with submission and acceptance dates (111 in the window); the latest was accepted on
Only articles that were accepted and published are counted, not the time spent on rejected manuscripts, so this usually runs longer than a publisher's "time to first decision".
Other sources
- Average review time (community reports)
- about 12 weeksLetPub ·
- Submission to first decision
- 9 daysPublisher website ·
- Submission to publication (journal-reported)
- about 12 weeksDOAJ ·
- Peer review
- Single anonymous peer reviewDOAJ
Community reports come from authors' own submissions (confidence 0.5) and are not a promise from the journal; for publisher figures, the journal's own definitions apply.
Fees & open access
APC and open-access policy
Fully open accessDOAJ
Every article is open access; authors usually pay an article processing charge (APC).
| Source | APC | Fee waiver | License | Observed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| DOAJ | EUR 2,890 / USD 3,390 / GBP 2,490 | Yes | CC BY, CC BY-NC-ND | |
| OpenAlex | USD 3,290 / EUR 2,790 / GBP 2,390 | — | — | |
| LetPub | GBP 2,390 / USD 3,290 / EUR 2,790 | Yes | — | |
| Publisher website | GBP 2,490 / USD 3,390 / EUR 2,890 | — | — |
Other charges and waivers (author guidelines)
- Other fees
- No other fees
The journal's website is authoritative for fees; sources were observed at different times and each keeps its own value, without averaging.
Submission
Article types and submission policies (journal website)
Open calls for papers1, by deadline
Publisher websiteWhat to prepare2 items from the author guidelines
- Suggested reviewers
- Optional
- Not considered
- preprint
Article types accepted3
- methodologyFormatting guidelines for specific article types can be found below. Research Review MethodologyLength not stated
- researchFormatting guidelines for specific article types can be found below. Research Review MethodologyLength not stated
- reviewFormatting guidelines for specific article types can be found below. Research Review MethodologyLength not stated
Policy excerpts from the journal's websiteData availability, License & copyright, Open access, Peer review
- Data availability Formatting the 'Availability of data and materials' section of your manuscript
Data availability: datasets should be deposited in public repositories or included in the paper/supporting files; 'Availability of data and materials' section required. Model summary
The following format for the 'Availability of data and materials section of your manuscript should be used:
Source ↗Publisher website ·- License & copyright Licensing and copyright
Open access licensing under CC BY-NC-ND or CC BY. Model summary
Creative Commons licences Open access articles in Springer Nature journals are published under Creative Commons licences. These provide an industry-standard framework to support easy re-use of open access material. Under Creative Commons licences, authors retain copyright of their articles. International Journal of Health Geographics articles are published open access under a CC BY-NC-ND (Creative…
Source ↗Publisher website ·- Open access Benefits of open access
Publishing open access (OA) offers a number of benefits, including greater reach and readership for your work: Cited more 1.6x more citations of OA articles than non-OA articles across all subjects Downloaded more 4x more downloads of OA articles than non-OA articles Greater impact 2.5x more Altmetric attention. OA articles attracted 1.9x more news mentions and 1.2x more policy mentions Open acces…
Source ↗Publisher website ·- Peer review Peer review policy
Peer review is the process used to evaluate the quality of a manuscript before publication. Independent researchers in the relevant field assess submitted manuscripts to check their validity and robustness. Their feedback guides editors in making publication decisions. Typically, two or more experts evaluate each manuscript based on three main criteria: scientific robustness: is the research metho…
Source ↗Publisher website ·
Excerpts are quoted from the journal's website; "model summary" lines are written by Workers AI and checked against the text. The journal's website is authoritative.
Profile
Publication details and official links
- Publisher
- BioMed Central
- Country or region
- ENGLAND
- Language
- English
- Founded
- 2002
- ISSN
- 1476-072X
- Official links
- Journal homepage ↗DOAJ
- Submission system ↗LetPub
- Author guidelines ↗LetPub
- Aims & Scope ↗LetPub
- Special issues ↗Publisher website
- APC information ↗DOAJ
- Fee waivers ↗DOAJ
- Open access statement ↗DOAJ
- License & copyright ↗DOAJ
- Peer review process ↗LetPub
- Editorial board ↗LetPub
- Plagiarism policy ↗DOAJ
FAQ
Frequently asked questions about International Journal of Health Geographics
What CAS zone is International Journal of Health Geographics in?
In the 2025 upgraded edition of the CAS Journal Ranking, International Journal of Health Geographics is in Zone 3 of Medicine, and in Zone 3 of the minor category Public, Environmental & Occupational Health. In the 2026 Xinrui edition it is in Zone 2 of Medicine. Zones from different editions, and from major and minor categories, are not interchangeable.
What is the impact factor of International Journal of Health Geographics?
The latest impact factor listed by LetPub is 4.08; CiteScore 4.8, h-index 118.
How long does peer review take at International Journal of Health Geographics?
Based on the dates recorded on 103 articles published between October 2024 and October 2026 (the last 24 months), the median time from submission to acceptance is 158 days (interquartile range 115–222 days); authors report an average review time of about 12 weeks. Article statistics cover accepted papers only, publisher figures follow the journal's own definitions, and community reports come from authors' own submissions; none is a promise from the journal.
Where are the editorial board members of International Journal of Health Geographics based?
Of the 43 board members whose country the journal's board page names, 6 (about 14%) are in mainland China; the countries named most often are United States (18), Mainland China (6) and United Kingdom (4). Counted from the institutions listed on the board page; for reference only.
Which databases index International Journal of Health Geographics?
According to LetPub and DOAJ records, International Journal of Health Geographics is indexed in SCIE, SSCI, Scopus and DOAJ. The journal's website also lists MEDLINE, CAS and CAB Abstracts; that list has not been checked against each database.
Is International Journal of Health Geographics open access, and what is the APC?
International Journal of Health Geographics is a fully open-access journal. APC about USD 3,390.
Sources and updates
The facts on this page come from LetPub, OpenAlex, DOAJ, Publisher website; every figure is tagged with its source and the date it was observed, and conflicting values are kept per source. LetPub source page: view ↗ (archived 2026-08-24). Last updated: .