Journal profile · CRITICAL CARE MEDICINE
Journal of Intensive Care Medicine
ISSN 0885-0666 · eISSN 1525-1489 · SAGE Publications Inc. · UNITED STATES
Journal of Intensive Care Medicine: CAS Zone 3 · Medicine (2025 upgraded edition); impact factor 2.21; hybrid open access; APC about USD 4,400; review about 113 days (submission to acceptance, publisher); acceptance rate 12.3% (journal website); 154 articles in 2025; indexed in SCIE and Scopus.
Scope
Aims, scope and focus
Journal of Intensive Care Medicine is published by SAGE Publications Inc. 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 Sepsis Diagnosis and Treatment, Respiratory Support and Mechanisms and Intensive Care Unit Cognitive Disorders, together about 36.6% of its articles. (generated from OpenAlex topic counts and CAS ranking data)
The practice of intensive care medicine crosses many medical specialties and disciplines — anesthesiology, cardiology, endocrinology, gastroenterology, hematology, immunology, infectious disease, neonatology, nephrology, neurology, nursing, pediatrics, pharmacology, psychiatry, pulmonology, radiology, rheumatology, surgery, toxicology, transplantation, and trauma—and presents many complex and difficult challenges. The Journal of Intensive Care Medicine is the only journal that offers all medical and surgical clinicians in adult and pediatric intensive care state-of-the-art, broad-based analytic reviews and updates, original articles, reports of large clinical series, techniques and procedures, topic-specific electronic resources, book reviews, and editorials on all aspects of intensive/critical/ coronary care. Superbly edited, the journal includes authoritative, peer-reviewed reviews of:Disease progression and treatment in intensive careCommon diagnostic and therapeutic procedures and techniques for a variety of organ systems New and experimental approaches to disease treatment Patient evaluation and management End of life issuesThe Journal of Intensive Care Medicine also discusses the essential principles, protocols, clinical presentations, guidelines, indications, contraindications, complications, necessary equipment, priorities, ethical and legal issues, changes, and recommendations for ongoing care for every aspect of ICU patient care.Some of the "hot" topics (right out of the latest headlines!) from recent issues include:Genetic predisposition toward critical illness Temporary cardiac pacing and defibrillation Medical aspects of biological and chemical agents of mass destruction Evaluation and management of poisoning Serial APACHE III scoring for acute renal failure in the ICUOther major clinical practice and research topics include:Acute Liver FailureAcute Renal FailureAdult Respiratory Disease Syndrome (ARDS)Cost-Effective Procedures Critical Illness of the ElderlyExternal Forces Shaping Intensive Care such as Organizational Quality, Health Care Reform, Ethics, and LawIntensive Care of Organ Transplant RecipientsIntensive Care of Patients with HIV DiseaseNon-Invasive VentilationNutritional Support in the ICUOutcomes: Long term Survival; Quality of LifeReperfusion Therapy for Acute Myocardial InfarctionShockSubarachnoid Hemorrhage Technology in the ICUTraumas: Brain Injury; Burns; Spinal Cord Injury; Abdominal Injury; Pediatric; Thoracic Injury; Multiple OrganFor the best coverage of the whole field of intensive care medicine in a scholarly review format, subscribe today to the Journal of Intensive Care Medicine!This journal is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE)Submit your manuscript today at https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/jicmedicine.
From the journal's Aims & Scope
Research area (LetPub): CRITICAL CARE MEDICINE
Editorial board by country: none in mainland China; most named United States 35 (35 members with a country) Editorial board ↗Publisher website ·
Main research topics OpenAlex counts of recent articles; shares are approximate
- Sepsis Diagnosis and TreatmentMedicine16.2%
- Respiratory Support and MechanismsMedicine10.5%
- Intensive Care Unit Cognitive DisordersMedicine9.9%
- Cardiac Arrest and ResuscitationMedicine6.9%
- Hemodynamic Monitoring and TherapyMedicine6.7%
- Nosocomial Infections in ICUMedicine4.9%
- Mechanical Circulatory Support DevicesEngineering4.6%
- Traumatic Brain Injury and Neurovascular DisturbancesMedicine3.1%
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 | Critical Care Medicine | Zone 3 |
Top journal: noReview journal: no
CAS Xinrui Journal Ranking (March 2026)Medicine Zone 3
| Level | Category | Zone |
|---|---|---|
| Major | Medicine | Zone 3 |
| Minor | Critical Care Medicine | Zone 4 |
Top journal: noReview journal: not marked
CAS Journal Ranking, previous upgraded edition (December 2023)Medicine Zone 3
| Level | Category | Zone |
|---|---|---|
| Major | Medicine | Zone 3 |
| Minor | Critical Care Medicine | Zone 4 |
Top journal: noReview journal: no
Database indexing
SCIEScopusLetPub
International journal early-warning lists: not listed in any editionLetPub
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
- 2.21LetPub ·
- Impact factor (publisher)
- 2.3Publisher website ·
- 5-year impact factor (publisher)
- 2.7Publisher website ·
- CiteScore 2026-06
- 5.5LetPub ·
- SJR 2026-06
- 0.76LetPub ·
- SNIP 2026-06
- 1.05LetPub ·
- h-index
- 52LetPub ·
- h-index
- 95OpenAlex ·
- i10-index
- 1,382OpenAlex ·
- 2-year mean citedness
- 2.08OpenAlex ·
- Self-citation rate
- 4.3%LetPub ·
- Share of gold OA articles
- 13.45%LetPub ·
Volume
- Articles per year
- 148LetPub ·
- Articles per year (publisher)
- 3Publisher website ·
Articles by year OpenAlex count · 3,360 in total · the current year is incomplete
| Year | Articles | Open access | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | 152 | 47 | 24 |
| 2025 | 154 | 58 | 300 |
| 2024 | 149 | 49 | 621 |
| 2023 | 151 | 68 | 1,334 |
| 2022 | 115 | 55 | 1,440 |
| 2021 | 150 | 65 | 2,770 |
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
Publisher-reported review time from the journal's website
113 dayssubmission to acceptance
The publisher's own definition applies; dates from this journal's articles in the last 24 months are not available yet, so the publisher's figure is used.
Figures by source
- Acceptance rate (publisher)
- 12.3%Publisher website ·
- Submission to first decision
- 1 daysPublisher website ·
- Submission to acceptance
- 113 daysPublisher website ·
- Acceptance to publication
- 22 daysPublisher website ·
- Peer review
- Single anonymous peer reviewPublisher website
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
Hybrid open accessLetPub
A subscription journal in which authors can pay to publish their article open access.
| Source | APC | Fee waiver | License | Observed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| OpenAlex | USD 4,400 / GBP 3,226 | — | — | |
| Publisher website | Yes, amount not published | — | — |
A hybrid journal charges the APC only when the author chooses open access; publishing under the subscription model is usually free.
Other charges and waivers (author guidelines)
- Other fees
- Charged; see the journal's website for the amount
- Page charges
- No page charges
- Submission fee
- No submission fee
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)
What to prepare2 items from the author guidelines
- Abstract
- 250–300 words
- Reference style
- AMA
Article types accepted10, with length limits
- analytic reviewsAnalytic Reviews: Reviews and updates on progress in treatment of disease entities in the intensive care unit (3000 to 7500 words).Length not stated
- correspondencePlease visit the Sage Journal Author Gateway for guidance on producing visual and/or video abstracts. Journal of Intensive Care Medicine welcomes manuscripts in…Length not stated
- letterPlease visit the Sage Journal Author Gateway for guidance on producing visual and/or video abstracts. Journal of Intensive Care Medicine welcomes manuscripts in…Length not stated
- literature reviewPlease visit the Sage Journal Author Gateway for guidance on producing visual and/or video abstracts. Journal of Intensive Care Medicine welcomes manuscripts in…main text ≤ 7,500 words
- new technologiesNew Technologies: Reviews of new technologies of interest to the practitioner of intensive care (2000 to 6000 words).Length not stated
- original researchPlease visit the Sage Journal Author Gateway for guidance on producing visual and/or video abstracts. Journal of Intensive Care Medicine welcomes manuscripts in…Length not stated
- reports of large clinical seriesReports of Large Clinical Series: Major accumulated clinical experience with conditions treated in the intensive care unit or reports of smaller series with ext…Length not stated
- reviewPlease visit the Sage Journal Author Gateway for guidance on producing visual and/or video abstracts. Journal of Intensive Care Medicine welcomes manuscripts in…main text ≤ 7,500 words
- surveyPlease visit the Sage Journal Author Gateway for guidance on producing visual and/or video abstracts. Journal of Intensive Care Medicine welcomes manuscripts in…main text ≤ 7,200 words
- techniques and proceduresTechniques and Procedures: Reviews of common intensive care procedures, discussion of large clinical experiences with procedures, novel approaches to a standard…Length not stated
Policy excerpts from the journal's websiteAuthorship, Data availability, Publication ethics, Open access, Peer review, Plagiarism, Preprints, Trial registration / reporting guidelines
- Authorship Author contributions
You will be asked to list the contribution of each author as part of the submission process. Please include the Author Contributions heading within your submission after the Acknowledgements section. The information you give on submission will then show under the Author Contributions heading later at the proofing stage.
Source ↗Publisher website ·- Data availability Data availability
The Journal is committed to facilitating openness, transparency and reproducibility of research, and has the following research data sharing policy. For more information, including FAQs please visit the Sage Research Data policy pages. Subject to appropriate ethical and legal considerations, authors are encouraged to: Share your research data in a relevant public data repository Include a data ava…
Source ↗Publisher website ·- Publication ethics Ethical considerations
Member of Committee on Publication Ethics Model summary
Please include your ethics approval statements under this heading, even if you have already included ethics approval information in your methods section. If ethical approval was not required, you need to explicitly state this. All papers reporting studies involving human participants, human data or human tissue must state that the relevant Ethics Committee or Institutional Review Board approved th…
Source ↗Publisher website ·- Open access Publishing fees and open access
There are no fees payable to submit or publish in this journal. Figures submitted in color will be published in color in the online version of the journal at no cost. Optional open access publishing is available for a fee via the Sage Choice program, and Open Access agreements, where authors can publish open access either discounted or free of charge depending on the agreement with Sage. Find out …
Source ↗Publisher website ·- Peer review Peer review policy
Single anonymized peer review Model summary
The following summary describes the peer review process for this journal: Identity transparency: Single-anonymized Reviewer interacts with: Editor Review information published: None Your manuscript will undergo an initial evaluation. If it does not conform to the requirements laid out in these guidelines, it will be returned to you for amendments prior to peer review. Manuscripts may be desk rejec…
Source ↗Publisher website ·- Plagiarism Plagiarism
The journal and Sage take issues of copyright infringement, plagiarism or other breaches of best practice in publication very seriously. Please read Sage's complete policy on plagiarism and the actions we may take.
Source ↗Publisher website ·- Preprints Preprints
The journal will consider submissions of manuscripts that have been posted on preprint servers. Please enter the preprint DOI in the designated field when submitting your manuscript. We advise that you inform the Journal Editorial office about your posted preprint at submission. Note that you should not post an updated version of your manuscript on a preprint server while it is being peer reviewed…
Source ↗Publisher website ·- Trial registration / reporting guidelines Clinical trial registration
The journal conforms to the ICMJE requirement that clinical trials are registered in a WHO-approved public trials registry at or before the time of first participant enrollment as a condition of consideration for publication. The trial registry name and URL, and registration number must be included at the end of the abstract.
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
- SAGE Publications Inc.
- Country or region
- UNITED STATES
- Language
- English
- ISSN
- 0885-0666
- Electronic ISSN
- 1525-1489
- Official links
- Journal homepage ↗LetPub
- Submission system ↗Publisher website
- Special issues ↗Publisher website
FAQ
Frequently asked questions about Journal of Intensive Care Medicine
What CAS zone is Journal of Intensive Care Medicine in?
In the 2025 upgraded edition of the CAS Journal Ranking, Journal of Intensive Care Medicine is in Zone 3 of Medicine, and in Zone 3 of the minor category Critical Care Medicine. In the 2026 Xinrui edition it is in Zone 3 of Medicine. Zones from different editions, and from major and minor categories, are not interchangeable.
What is the impact factor of Journal of Intensive Care Medicine?
The latest impact factor listed by LetPub is 2.21; CiteScore 5.5, h-index 95.
How long does peer review take at Journal of Intensive Care Medicine?
The publisher reports about 113 days (submission to acceptance); the journal's website gives an acceptance rate of 12.3%. 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.
What are the manuscript requirements of Journal of Intensive Care Medicine?
According to the journal's author guidelines: Abstract: 250–300 words; Reference style: AMA. A model extracted these from the author guidelines and each was checked against the text; check the latest version on the journal's website before submitting.
Where are the editorial board members of Journal of Intensive Care Medicine based?
Of the 35 board members whose country the journal's board page names, none are in mainland China; the countries named most often are United States (35). Counted from the institutions listed on the board page; for reference only.
Which databases index Journal of Intensive Care Medicine?
According to LetPub and DOAJ records, Journal of Intensive Care Medicine is indexed in SCIE and Scopus.
Is Journal of Intensive Care Medicine open access, and what is the APC?
Journal of Intensive Care Medicine is a hybrid journal. For open-access publication: APC about USD 4,400.
Sources and updates
The facts on this page come from LetPub, Publisher website, OpenAlex; 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 2026-08-25). Last updated: .