The principal aim of the Portuguese Journal of Cardiology, founded in 1982 as the official journal of the Portuguese Society of Cardiology (SPC), is to inform and train Portuguese cardiologists. Its mission is to act as a showcase of excellence for Portuguese cardiology, both nationally and internationally.

Since its foundation, the Journal has followed a path of excellence and success, as shown by its status as a peer-reviewed open access journal indexed in PubMed, published monthly in Portuguese and English, with an official impact factor, and now published by one of the world's leading scientific publishers. These achievements are not within the reach of many journals of European national medical societies, and have only been possible through the efforts and dedication of a large team, particularly its editors, reviewers and secretariat, as well as of the governing bodies of the SPC, who have throughout shown a strong commitment to attaining these goals. Special mention should be made of the outstanding work of Prof. Fausto Pinto, who has been one of the main driving forces behind many of the above achievements, thanks to his strategic vision and international prestige. We are all grateful for Prof. Pinto's excellent work over the years and for his dedication to the SPC in general and to the Journal in particular.

My recent appointment as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal by the Board of the SPC following a national public competition is a great honor and an enormous responsibility. It is a great honor because the position of Editor-in-Chief of the Journal is without doubt a post of considerable scientific prestige; I shall do my best to repay the trust that the Board of the SPC has placed in me. It is also an enormous responsibility, as my task will be to continue the work of the editors-in-chief who came before me and who have taken the Journal to the level of excellence it currently enjoys. It will be my job to maintain this course and if possible to go even further.

What prompted my decision to put myself forward for this position was the desire to serve the SPC once more. At various times during of my career I have been called upon to serve the Society, and have always done so with enthusiasm, professionalism and dedication; I am now ready to do so again. Among my reasons for running for the post was the considerable editorial experience I have accumulated over the years, at both national and international level, as well as my many years in clinical, epidemiological and translational research. The fact that I also have over 14 years’ experience in areas related to training and education in cardiology at the European level led me to believe that I could make a worthwhile contribution to the Journal and through it, to the SPC.

For the Journal to stay on its path of success and to continue to grow as an excellent showcase for Portuguese cardiology, the editorial team propose the following goals for the next four years, among others:

• 1.

  to forge a closer strategic relationship with the governing board of the SPC, with regular meetings to report on the most salient facts concerning the Journal, to assess ongoing projects, and to propose and discuss future plans in detail;

• 2.

  to organize initiatives that will increase the Journal's impact factor;

• 3.

  to provide peer reviewers with a list of articles previously published in the Journal on the subject-matter they are reviewing. In this way reviewers will be in a better position to inform authors when they have not referred to such articles if they are relevant. This will enhance the value of earlier studies, enable comparisons between and discussion of previous results in Portugal, and make it easier to judge the originality of the work under review. Similar approaches are adopted by journals in other countries, which provide access to databases of articles related to the subject being reviewed;

• 4.

  to revise the Journal's regulations, the last version of which was issued a decade ago in 2005. The updating process has already begun, keeping most of the content of the previous version, but bringing the journal closer to the organizational structure of the European Heart Journal, maintaining the post of Editor-in-Chief and the current seven Associate Editors, but adding two Deputy Editors, as well as the new positions of Statistics Editor, Ethics Editor, and Editorial and Bibliographical Consultant to provide support to reviewers when requested;

• 5.

  to update the Journal's image to bring it more in line with the current European Society of Cardiology (ESC) journal family;

• 6.

  to maintain and if possible increase exchanges with other national and foreign cardiology journals through the excellent forum that is provided by the ESC Editors’ Network, a platform for direct communication and interaction between the editors-in-chief of the national cardiology journals of all ESC member states. Particular attention will be paid to our relations with the Spanish Journal of Cardiology and the Brazilian Journal of Cardiology, for historical and strategic reasons;

• 7.

  to reduce the time taken to review and publish articles, which in some cases is excessive. This can be achieved by selecting reviewers who are experts and active in their field and able to provide prompt responses. Furthermore, a general meeting of peer reviewers during the Portuguese Congress of Cardiology, to present data on the Journal's activity and a list of the top ten reviewers in terms of response time, may act as a stimulus to improved performance, as is the practice of some cardiovascular medicine journals in other countries;

• 8.

  to increase the multimedia content of the Journal and to improve its communications strategy;

• 9.

  to improve the management of the Journal's finances.

The mission of the SPC is to promote the development of cardiology for the benefit of the Portuguese people, through various initiatives as listed in article 3 of the Society's statutes. One of these is “to publish a journal and to disseminate scientific documents among its members”. This statutory goal is fundamental, and must be maintained in the future, with a view to sustaining progress in Portuguese cardiovascular medicine. Such an aim can only be achieved with the collaboration and commitment of all members, and the editorial team is counting on everyone to bring this about.