Is there any Influence of Journal Impact Factor on the Citation Index of Articles Published in Brazilian Journals with International Scope?

With the recent disclosure of the journals impact factors of 2014 by Thomson-Reuters, we verified that the Brazilian Archives of Cardiology maintained its Impact Factor (IF) at the same levels observed in recent years, contrary to the expected prospects since the publication of its first index five years ago. A similar situation has also been observed regarding most journals with international scope published in Brazil, despite the many efforts by their editors to attract the publication of the best scientific quality articles, as well as to improve publication editorial quality.

The fact that the IF has remained unchanged represents a significant problem for the national publication journals, as the Brazilian postgraduate courses are the most important suppliers of high-quality works for publication and the main mission of our journals is precisely to facilitate the dissemination of scientific research carried out in our country. As the result of the maintenance of the scoring criteria of postgraduate programs by the Higher Education Personnel Training Coordination (Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior – Capes) of the Ministry of Education, based on the impact factor of journals where our scientists publish their research, a vicious circle is formed, which does not favor the development of our publications.

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