Forty-five years of Acta Myologica: from the initiative of two myology dreamers to the reality of a scientific journal internationally recognized

The first thirty years of Acta Myologica (AM) were masterfully commented by the late Professor Reinhardt Rudel, one of the first and most active co-editors in his Editorial¹ of June 2011.

Acta Myologica has been the first “open access” journal in the history of the scientific publishing, being distributed free of charge since its inception to 1,000 libraries and 5,000 researchers worldwide, evidence of the foresight that has always characterized Giovanni Nigro. Since 2008, the articles published in the Journal can be downloaded free of charge from PubMed, as a service to all readers.

One of the most dramatic changes in the journal’s editorial staff occurred after the passing of Lucia Comi on April 29, 2009. As one of the magazine founders, she had dedicated much of her time and energy to this work, so dear to her. On that occasion, Vincenzo Nigro joined his father as assistant editor, while I had the honour and responsibility of inheriting Lucia’s position as managing editor. It was challenging for me to replace her, but thanks to the constant presence of Professor Giovanni Nigro, who always cared for Acta Myologica as one of his most cherished creations, I tried to do my best.

Since 2011, Acta Myologica has become the official journal not only of the Mediterranean Society of Myology, but also of the Italian Association of Myology. 

Starting with the second issue of 2016 AM went online, with an electronic manuscript submission process, faster review, and completely free web access. The goal was to revitalize the historic paper journal dedicated to clinical and molecular myology, disseminating new knowledge through multimedia platforms. Furthermore, given the journal growing number of citations, the Editorial Board decided to increase the number of issues per year from three to four, published in March, June, September, and December, respectively. In those years the Journal had increased the number of its citations and had a H Index of 22 (Scimago Journal & Country Rank). 

When in October 13, 2017 Professor Giovanni Nigro unexpectedly passed away, it was difficult to continue without his guidance. Both his sons, Vincenzo and Gerardo, wanted me to take over the journal, with the valuable support of Vincenzo. 

Over these eight years, the scientific recognition achieved by Acta Myologica is reflected in the graphs of citations per document (Fig. 1) and in the increase in the H index from 22 to 40. 

Furthermore, AM has obtained a citation index of 2.2 for 2024 (Fig. 2) by Scopus, and has listed in Q3/Q2 ranking among the journals of Internal Medicine and in the top 40% among Cardiology journals.

The number of papers published in the period 2021-2024, based on their origin, Italian or foreign, is shown in Figure 3, while the countries of foreign authors who published on AM in the same period are reported in Figure 4.

Achieving these goals was possible thanks to teamwork. We do like first to thank Mara Di Stefano, Copy Editor at Pacini Editore srl, for her contribution to the editorial and production process. She does a lot of the editing, solves problems about the website, and works on page layout and proofs. She is also determined to keep AM on track and on schedule. 

We are also grateful to our Editorial Board and Staff members and to many reviewers, both new and veteran, whose reviews have always been thoughtful and insightful. 

Our next milestone will be for the journal to finally get the long-awaited Impact Factor that we wish is almost there.

We wish everyone a peaceful Christmas and a prosperous 2026.