BMJ Open is a medical journal. We consider papers addressing research questions in clinical medicine, public health and epidemiology. We also welcome studies in health services research, health economics, surgery, qualitative research, research methods, medical education, medical publishing and any other field that directly addresses patient outcomes or the practice and delivery of healthcare.

Our focus is on research that is relevant to patients and clinicians. We do not publish studies conducted in animals, laboratory studies not linked to patient outcomes, papers reporting solely physiological or biomechanical results from healthy participants, anatomy, cell biology or non-clinical psychology.

All research study types are considered, from study protocols through phase I trials to meta-analyses. This includes specialist studies and studies reporting negative results.  Case reports should be submitted to BMJ Case Reports.
Our aim is to provide a home for all properly conducted medical research to be fully reported, after a rigorous and transparent peer review process. See our Resources for authors for more information on what we look for in a research study and how to maximise your chances of publication.

Publishing procedures are built around fully open peer review and continuous publication, publishing research online as soon as the article is ready. BMJ Open aims to promote transparency in the publication process by publishing reviewer reports and previous versions of manuscripts as prepublication histories.