SSM: Qualitative Research in Health

About SSM: Qualitative Research in Health

About SSM: Qualitative Research in Health

SSM: Qualitative Research in Health (abbreviated SSM Qual. Res. Health; article DOI prefix 10.1016/j.ssmqr) is an open-access, peer-reviewed journal published by Elsevier. It is part of the Social Science & Medicine (SSM) family of journals — a cluster of Elsevier titles built around the long-established flagship journal Social Science & Medicine — and it is dedicated specifically to advancing qualitative research on health, illness, medical care, disease, and wellbeing. The journal began publishing in 2021, with Volume 1 (December 2021), and releases articles online as they are received, accumulating them into annual volumes.

The journal's core proposition is to give qualitative health research a dedicated, high-visibility home within one of the most influential publishing ecosystems in the social sciences of health. Rather than competing with mixed-methods or quantitative journals, it concentrates exclusively on research that uses qualitative inquiry — ethnography, phenomenology, grounded theory, narrative inquiry, interviews, focus groups, discourse and thematic analysis — to examine how people experience, understand, and act upon health and healthcare. Its scope spans patients' and caregivers' lived experiences, health professionals' practices, the social and cultural dimensions of illness, health equity and social justice, and the ways health policies and systems affect individuals and communities.

SSM: Qualitative Research in Health is an online-only journal. Its ISSN — 2667-3215 — serves as both print and electronic identifier in the sense that no separate print edition exists; catalogues record it as an online resource. Articles are published open access under Creative Commons licences (CC BY, CC BY-NC, or CC BY-NC-ND, as listed by DOAJ), archived in CLOCKSS and Portico, and assigned DOIs for permanent citation. The journal is indexed in the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), Scopus, and the Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI) of the Web of Science Core Collection, and it holds the DOAJ Seal, which recognises journals meeting particularly high standards of openness and publishing practice.

The typical article is an empirical qualitative study, but the journal also publishes methodological papers, literature reviews with a qualitative orientation, short communications, opinion pieces, and special issues on topical themes — such as the 2025 special issue on mapping genomic screening between public health and personalized medicine, which illustrates the journal's interest in how qualitative and interdisciplinary approaches can illuminate evolving health technologies and their regulatory, experiential, and ethical dimensions.

History and Background

SSM: Qualitative Research in Health was launched in 2021 as Elsevier's answer to a long-standing structural problem in health publishing: high-quality qualitative research has historically struggled for space in journals dominated by quantitative paradigms, and many generalist qualitative or social-science journals lack the health focus and readership that qualitative health researchers need. Building on the reputation and readership of Social Science & Medicine — one of the most cited journals in health social science — the new title offered an alternative outlet with the same broad interdisciplinary orientation, but dedicated to qualitative inquiry.

The first volume appeared in December 2021, with early articles covering topics such as professional identity transitions among new nurses in low- and middle-income countries — an emblematic example of the journal's interest in the social and psychological dimensions of health work. Publication continued with Volume 2 (December 2022), and the journal has since grown its output year on year, accumulating several hundred published articles by the mid-2020s. The journal's citation profile developed quickly: Scopus-derived records show coverage from 2021 onward, and by the 2024 metrics cycle third-party metric sites reported the journal ranking in the top quartiles of its Scimago subject categories.

Structurally, the journal follows the modern Elsevier open-access model: continuous online publication within annual volumes, an article-based workflow, and a production pipeline shared with the wider SSM family. Its keywords, as registered with DOAJ — qualitative research, medical care, illness, health, disease, wellbeing — succinctly capture its remit, and its Library of Congress classification (Medicine: Public aspects of medicine) places it squarely in the health social sciences.

Aims and Scope

The journal's aims and scope centre on advancing the understanding of health-related phenomena through qualitative research. It prioritises studies that use qualitative methodologies to capture the nuanced experiences of individuals and communities in health contexts, and it explicitly encourages work that bridges disciplinary boundaries — integrating insights from sociology, psychology, anthropology, nursing, public health, health policy, and related fields.

Within this broad frame, several thematic emphases recur. Health equity and social justice are core concerns: the journal welcomes research on the social determinants of health and the experiences of marginalised populations, including ethnic minorities, LGBTQ+ people, people living with disabilities, and communities in low- and middle-income countries. Patient-centred and experience-focused research is another pillar — studies that foreground patient, caregiver, and community voices in order to improve healthcare practices and policies. The journal also examines the impact of health policy and practice on lived experience, including research responding to global health crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic.

Methodologically, the journal is pluralist rather than prescriptive. It publishes work drawing on ethnography, phenomenology, grounded theory, narrative and biographical methods, discourse analysis, participatory and community-based research, and innovative or creative qualitative approaches. Manuscripts are expected to make a substantive contribution: to theory, to methodology, or to the understanding of a health phenomenon — description alone is not enough. The journal's review standards emphasise rigour in qualitative design, transparency in analytic procedures, ethical conduct, and the quality of interpretation and writing.

Article types accepted include full-length original research articles, methodological studies, literature and scoping reviews with a qualitative emphasis, short communications, opinion and commentary pieces, and special-issue contributions. The journal periodically issues calls for special issues or sections reflecting current interests — recent examples include the critical, empirically grounded examination of genomic screening across public health and personalised medicine, with guest editors drawn from European research institutes.

Publication Details

Title: SSM: Qualitative Research in Health (ISO abbreviation: SSM Qual. Res. Health)
Publisher: Elsevier (Elsevier Ltd., United Kingdom; editorial operations via Amsterdam, Netherlands)
First published: 2021 (Volume 1, December 2021)
ISSN (online only): 2667-3215
DOI prefix: 10.1016/j.ssmqr
Publication model: Fully open access. Articles are published under CC BY, CC BY-NC, or CC BY-NC-ND licences (author's choice of the licences offered), with the DOAJ Seal awarded for high standards of openness. Reading access is free of charge; full texts are available via ScienceDirect from Volume 1 (2021) onward.
Article processing charges: Yes. DOAJ records the journal as charging up to 1,450 USD as publication fees, with a waiver policy; the Electronic Journals Library (EZB) record, updated April 2026 from publisher information, lists 2,200 USD. Authors should confirm the current fee on the journal's official page before submission, as fees are subject to change.
Frequency: Annual volumes, with articles published online as received (continuous publication within the volume). One issue per year in indexing records.
Copyright: The author does not retain unrestricted copyrights and publishing rights under the journal's standard open-access agreements; licensing terms apply per article.
Archiving: Articles are digitally archived in CLOCKSS and Portico; each article carries a permanent DOI.
Plagiarism screening: The journal checks submissions for plagiarism.
Language: English (manuscripts accepted in English only).
Peer review: Double anonymous peer review.

Editorial Information

Like its SSM sibling titles, the journal operates with an international editorial board of qualitative health researchers and uses a structured peer-review workflow managed through Elsevier's editorial systems. Detailed current editorial-board membership is published on the journal's official homepage (linked via ScienceDirect); names change over time and are not reproduced here to avoid presenting stale information. Authors considering submission should consult the current editorial board listing on the journal's official site for the relevant handling editors in their topic area.

The journal's relationship with Social Science & Medicine is one of shared standards and general approach rather than shared editors: as with the SSM family's other spin-off titles, it maintains its own editorial identity while benefiting from the SSM brand's recognition among health social scientists. Special issues are overseen by guest editors with subject expertise — for example, the 2025 special issue on genomic screening was guest-edited by researchers from the Spanish Scientific Research Council, INSERM, and the University of Copenhagen.

Indexing and Abstracting

SSM: Qualitative Research in Health is indexed in:

• Scopus — with coverage from 2021 onward
• Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) — the journal holds the DOAJ Seal
• Web of Science — Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI), part of the Web of Science Core Collection
• Clarivate Master Journal List
• Electronic library catalogues and discovery systems worldwide, including the Electronic Journals Library (EZB), ZDB, and university library catalogues (e.g., UMass Boston), with full-text availability recorded from Volume 1 (2021)

DOAJ indexing also means the journal's articles are discoverable through DOAJ's search, and the DOAJ record documents its open-access credentials, licensing, archiving, and review policies in a standardised form.

Metrics

Metrics for this journal should be treated with care, because third-party metric aggregators report differing figures and the journal's ESCI status means it has not traditionally carried a Journal Impact Factor in the same way as journals indexed in the Science or Social Sciences Citation Indexes. The following figures are attributed to their sources and should be verified against current official data before being cited in a funding application or promotion case:

• Per resurchify (Scimago-derived data): SCImago Journal Rank (SJR) 0.966, best quartile Q1 in Health (social science) and Social Sciences (miscellaneous), h-index 16, Scopus coverage 2021–2025.
• Per jrank.net (2024 metrics): Journal Impact Factor 1.80, SJR 0.65, h-index 9, Q2 in Health (Social Science) / Q1 in Social Sciences (Miscellaneous) by 2023.

These aggregators disagree on SJR, quartile, and h-index values — reflecting different data snapshots and calculation methods — so neither should be treated as an official figure. Elsevier and Clarivate's official pages are the authoritative sources for any current ranking or citation metric. What is firmly established is the journal's inclusion in Scopus and ESCI, its DOAJ Seal, and its rapid establishment of a citation footprint within five years of launch.

Submission Guidance

Authors considering SSM: Qualitative Research in Health should prepare for a rigorous qualitative peer-review process and a substantial time investment:

• Fit: Manuscripts must be qualitative (or centrally concerned with qualitative inquiry) and must address health, illness, medical care, disease, or wellbeing. Purely quantitative studies are out of scope; mixed-methods work should have a strong qualitative component.
• Review model: Double anonymous peer review — authors and reviewers are both anonymised. Manuscripts must be anonymised before submission, including removal of identifying self-citations where possible.
• Plagiarism screening: Submissions are checked for plagiarism; ensure all sources are cited and that previously published material (including the author's own) is properly disclosed.
• Timeline: DOAJ records an average of 21 weeks from submission to publication; EZB (publisher-supplied, 2026) lists 22 weeks. Plan accordingly for thesis and grant timelines.
• Fees: An article processing charge applies (DOAJ: up to 1,450 USD; EZB/publisher 2026: 2,200 USD), with a waiver policy available. Confirm the current APC on the journal's official page; institutional open-access agreements with Elsevier may cover the fee.
• Licensing: Authors choose from CC BY, CC BY-NC, or CC BY-NC-ND licences; note that under the journal's agreements the author does not retain unrestricted copyright.
• Manuscript preparation: Follow the journal's Guide for Authors (via the official journal page), including formatting, reference style, structured abstract requirements, and any word limits for article types. Ethical approval statements and details of informed consent are required for empirical studies involving human participants.
• Special issues: Check the journal's calls for papers for special-issue opportunities aligned with your topic; guest-edited collections can offer a thematically focused and well-read venue.

Frequently Asked Questions

What does "SSM" stand for?

SSM stands for Social Science & Medicine, the flagship journal of Elsevier's health-social-science family. SSM: Qualitative Research in Health is one of the SSM family titles, dedicated specifically to qualitative research.

Is the journal open access?

Yes, fully. All articles are free to read from Volume 1 (2021) onward via ScienceDirect. Articles are published under Creative Commons licences (CC BY, CC BY-NC, or CC BY-NC-ND), and the journal holds the DOAJ Seal.

What is the ISSN?

2667-3215. The journal is online-only, so this single ISSN covers the electronic edition.

Does it have an impact factor?

The journal is indexed in Scopus and in the Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI). Third-party aggregators report varying metrics (see the Metrics section), but these are not official figures; check Elsevier's and Clarivate's official pages for current values.

How long does peer review take?

DOAJ records an average of about 21 weeks from submission to publication; publisher-supplied data via EZB lists 22 weeks. The journal uses double anonymous peer review.

Is there an article processing charge?

Yes. DOAJ lists charges of up to 1,450 USD with a waiver policy; the EZB record (publisher information, updated April 2026) lists 2,200 USD. Confirm the current fee on the official journal page before submitting.

What kinds of articles does it publish?

Original qualitative research articles, methodological papers, qualitative literature reviews, short communications, opinion pieces, and special-issue articles. All work must centre on qualitative inquiry into health, illness, care, or wellbeing.

Who reads this journal?

Qualitative health researchers, medical sociologists and anthropologists, public-health scholars, nursing and allied-health researchers, health-policy analysts, and graduate students in the health social sciences.

Why This Journal Matters for Qualitative Health Researchers

Qualitative research has long been methodologically indispensable and institutionally under-housed: essential to understanding illness experience, care practices, and health inequities, yet frequently squeezed into journals whose editors and reviewers privilege quantitative designs. SSM: Qualitative Research in Health addresses that gap directly, offering a venue where qualitative rigour is the assumed standard rather than the exception, where reviewers are chosen for qualitative expertise, and where the readership arrives already convinced that narrative, observation, and interpretation are legitimate ways of knowing about health. Its rapid indexing, DOAJ Seal, and growing citation profile suggest the bet is paying off — and for authors, it represents one of the clearest signals in contemporary publishing that qualitative health research has a first-class home.

Sources and Verification Notes

Journal identity, publisher (Elsevier), ISSN 2667-3215, launch year (2021), open-access model, licences, archiving (CLOCKSS, Portico), review model (double anonymous), submission-to-publication time (21–22 weeks), APC figures (DOAJ: up to 1,450 USD; EZB/publisher 2026: 2,200 USD), DOAJ Seal, and indexing (DOAJ, Scopus, ESCI) were verified against the DOAJ record (doaj.org/toc/2667-3215), the Electronic Journals Library records, and university library catalogue records. Metric figures (SJR, quartiles, h-index) are attributed to third-party aggregators (resurchify, jrank.net) and are explicitly flagged as non-official and mutually inconsistent. The journal's aims and scope are paraphrased from its published positioning; the official Elsevier/ScienceDirect pages could not be text-extracted during research (access restrictions), so scope wording here is the author's paraphrase grounded in the DOAJ keywords and the journal's documented editorial positioning.

The SSM Family and Where This Journal Sits

To understand SSM: Qualitative Research in Health, it helps to understand the publishing family it belongs to. Social Science & Medicine, founded in 1967, is one of the most influential journals in the health social sciences, publishing interdisciplinary work on the social, cultural, economic, and political dimensions of health and medicine. Over the decades, Elsevier built a cluster of companion titles around it — including SSM – Population Health (an online-only, open-access journal covering social-science research on population health, sharing the flagship's broad interdisciplinary approach and prioritising fast peer review) and SSM – Mental Health — each addressing a distinct sub-community while trading on the SSM brand's recognition.

SSM: Qualitative Research in Health follows the same logic but organises the family by methodology rather than topic: it is the SSM title for researchers whose primary identity is qualitative. This positioning matters for authors choosing between outlets. A qualitative study of chronic-illness experience could plausibly be submitted to the flagship Social Science & Medicine, to a sociology or anthropology journal, to a nursing or public-health journal, or to this title. The distinctive offer here is a readership and reviewer pool assembled specifically around qualitative expertise — reviewers who will evaluate theoretical sampling, analytic rigour, and interpretive quality on their own terms rather than as deviations from quantitative norms — combined with the visibility and production standards of a major commercial publisher.

The journal's special-issue programme further differentiates it. Guest-edited collections on emerging topics — such as the 2025 collection on genomic screening spanning public health and personalised medicine — allow the journal to convene interdisciplinary conversations that single articles cannot, and they give authors a thematically coherent, well-promoted venue. Prospective authors should watch the journal's calls for papers, as special issues in this title tend to attract strong readership within their niches.

What Makes a Strong Submission

Although the journal's detailed Guide for Authors lives on its official page, the contours of a competitive submission can be inferred from the journal's positioning, its review model, and its published content. First, theoretical and methodological contribution: the journal seeks work that advances understanding, not merely documents it. A strong manuscript articulates what is already known, identifies a genuine gap or puzzle, and shows how the study's design and interpretation move the conversation forward — whether theoretically, methodologically, or empirically.

Second, methodological transparency and rigour: qualitative reviewers in this venue expect clear accounts of sampling and recruitment, data generation, analytic procedures (e.g., how thematic, narrative, or discourse analysis was actually conducted), researcher reflexivity, and ethical safeguards. Vague invocations of "thematic analysis" without procedural detail are a common reason for rejection across qualitative journals, and this title is no exception.

Third, rich, well-analysed data: the journal's emphasis on capturing nuanced experience means that manuscripts live or die on the quality of their empirical material and the depth of interpretation. Extended data extracts, carefully contextualised, with analysis that goes beyond paraphrase to genuine interpretation, characterise the journal's best-published work.

Fourth, writing quality: qualitative articles are read as texts, and clarity, structure, and narrative craft matter more here than in many quantitative venues. A well-organised manuscript with a compelling analytic arc — from puzzle through data to interpretation and implications — will fare better than a descriptively dense but analytically thin one.

Finally, ethical completeness: empirical studies must document ethical approval, informed consent procedures, and data-management arrangements. Studies involving vulnerable populations, sensitive topics, or cross-cultural fieldwork should show particular care in describing how ethical challenges were handled — a point of special relevance given the journal's emphasis on marginalised communities and health equity.