About the Journal

Focus and Scope

The Heart Surgery Forum® (HSF, Print ISSN: 1098-3511, Electronic ISSN: 1522-6662) is an international peer-reviewed, open access journal seeking original investigative and clinical work on any subject germane to cardiac surgical science or practice. The HSF publishes original scientific reports, collective reviews, case reports, editorials, and letters to the editor. New manuscripts are reviewed by reviewers for originality, content, relevancy and adherence to scientific principles in a double-blind process. Authors are encouraged to submit full color images and video that will be included in the web version of the journal at no charge.

Impact Factor

Current Impact Factor: 0.6
Scopus CiteScore: 1.0
JCR Category Rank: Q4 in CARDIAC & CARDIOVASCULAR SYSTEMS; Q4 in SURGERY

Indexing & Archiving

All articles published in The Heart Surgery Forum will be indexed in Science Citation Index Expanded (also known as SciSearch), ISI Alerting Services, Current Contents/Clinical Medicine, and EMBASE.

Publication Frequency

Publication Frequency: Monthly
The Heart Surgery Forum
will publish individual articles as soon as they have completed the production process and the publication fee has been received. Articles will be added to the current volume's Table of Contents. 

High-Quality Review

Beginning with Volume 20, Issue 1, all articles published in The Heart Surgery Forum will be freely available online. By becoming open access, the HSF provides the most up-to-date research and clinical information to the largest global community of heart specialists.

For authors, we provide more readers, citations, and recognition of your work.

For readers, we offer the latest state-of-the-art techniques and clinical research in half of the time of most print journals. Article Processing Charges are required after a manuscript has been accepted for publication. The journal will not issue refunds of any kind after the acceptance of the manuscript.

The Heart Surgery Forum offers many unique advantages:

  • Indexed in ISI, EMBASE, SciSearch, Google Scholar
  • Average time to first decision of two weeks
  • Constructive, stringent double-blinded, peer review
  • No color figure charges

Journal History

In 1997, The Heart Surgery Forum (HSF) was inaugurated by Mark M. Levinson, MD, as a multimedia scientific publication, which communicated over the new “Information Highway” known as the Web. The HSF began as a “labor of love” for heart surgeons as a dynamic tool for the betterment of themselves and their patients. Included in the original HSF website was a novel means to present interesting cases using color photos, movies, text and graphics, which was groundbreaking at that time.

Today, the HSF continues as one of the leading cardiothoracic resources in more than 182 countries. Published first online and then in print, the HSF publishes original scientific reports, collective reviews, case reports, editorials, and letters to the editor on the latest advances and studies in cardiac care.

Now open access and free to the world for the first time, the HSF provides the most up-to-date research and clinical information to the largest global community of heart specialists. For authors, we provide more readers, more citations, and more recognition of your work. For readers, we offer the latest state-of-the-art techniques and clinical research in half of the time of most print journals.