The 2013 impact factor ratings place the IJE (edited by Professor George Davey Smith and Professor Shah Ebrahim in the School of Social and Community Medicine) first out of a field of 160 journals.

Under the editorship of Professors Davey Smith and Ebrahim, the journal has slowly risen up the impact factor rankings, but this year it made a major leap to outstrip its main American rivals: Environmental Health Perspectives and Epidemiologic Reviews (both frequently ranked first), Epidemiology, and the American Journal of Epidemiology.

Paul Kidd of Oxford University Press, which publishes the IJE, commented: ‘An increase of this magnitude in one year is very rare and a great result for the IJE. This is a triumph for the hard work and dedication of the Editors and Editorial Board.'