Librarians' Rx just posted regarding BioMed Central and the recent ISI impact factors for BMC journals.
According to the BioMed Central press release five BMC journals have impact factors that make them among the top five journals in their specialty. The impact factors, which are calculated by ISI, look at citations in 2004 of articles published in the journals in the period 2002-2003.

Some notable titles and impact factors:

• BMC Bioinformatics - Launched in 2000, it has an impact factor 5.42 making it the second highest ranked bioinformatics journal. It already has an impact factor "comparable to that of Bioinformatics (5.74), the most established journal in the field, which has been publishing for more than two decades and is supported by a major society."
• BMC Genomics - It has an impact factor of 3.25 ranking it in the top third of the genetics titles, and the top 20% of biotechnology journals.
• Critical Care - The impact factor jumped from 1.9 to 3.21, is now third most cited journal (above the journal Intensive Care Medicine) in the Critical Care medicine field.
• Breast Cancer Research - It increased it's impact factor from 2.93 to 2.98 and remains the second highest ranking breast cancer journal.
• Arthritis Research & Therapy - It has an impact factor of 4.55 and maintains its rank of second in the rheumatology field.
• Respiratory Research - It has an impact factor of 4.03, establishing it as the fifth most cited journal in the "highly competitive respirology field."

This affirms that open access journals can be high quality, widely read, cited, and respected by researchers as the place for authors to submit their research. According to Dr Matthew Cockerill, Director of Operations at BioMed Central, "These latest impact factors show that BioMed Central's Open Access journals have joined the mainstream of science publishing, and can compete with traditional journals on their own terms. The impact factors also demonstrate one of the key benefits that Open Access offers authors: high visibility and, as a result, a high rate of citation."