The most recent announcement of 2014 Impact Factors for scientific journals showed that Prenatal Diagnosis, of which MIRI’s Executive Director Dr. Diana W. Bianchi is Editor-in-Chief, rose to an impressive 3.268, up from 2.514 last year. Impact factors track the number of times a given paper is cited by other authors over a limited period of time. In the “Obstetrics & Gynecology” category, the journal’s ranking climbed seven places to 11th out of 79. Prenatal Diagnosis also surged a full 31 places in the “Genetics & Heredity” category to now rank 57th out of 167.
Prenatal Diagnosis publishes articles in all aspects of prenatal diagnosis with a particular focus on areas in which molecular biology and genetics interface with prenatal care and therapy, encompassing:
- all aspects of fetal imaging, including sonography and magnetic resonance imaging
- prenatal cytogenetics, including molecular studies and array CGH
- prenatal screening studies
- fetal cells and cell-free nucleic acids in maternal blood and other fluids
- preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD)
- prenatal diagnosis of single gene disorders, including metabolic disorders
- fetal therapy
- fetal and placental development and pathology
- development and evaluation of laboratory services for prenatal diagnosis
- psychosocial, legal, ethical and economic aspects of prenatal diagnosis
- prenatal genetic counseling
“On behalf of the Editorial team,” Dr. Bianchi noted, “we are all very excited that the papers we are publishing in Prenatal Diagnosis are having a major influence on other authors who are writing in the specialties of Obstetrics and Gynecology and Medical Genetics. For a sub-specialty journal to be ranked so highly within the category of Obstetrics and Gynecology is a major accomplishment.”