This editorial title could also be ‘Hello, my name is Pulmonology’ with the subtitle ‘No, I am not a new medical journal, behind me there is a long, hard, remarkable journey’

This is the first edition of Pulmonology, but we can also consider it as the first number of the 24th edition of the Revista Portuguesa de Pneumologia (RPP), a new era or a new step forward in the life of the Sociedade Portuguesa de Pneumologia's (SPP) scientific journal. Like human life with its successive stages according to changing needs, habits and behaviours, a medical journal continually needs to innovate in order to be competitive in the demanding world of scientific publications.

In previous editorials and meetings we have already discussed and explained the reasons for this change, but this evolution was primarily the result of the progressive increase in the impact factor, which is inevitably associated with higher international scrutiny and requires editorial resources that are only possible in a journal open to the international scientific and academic community.1–6

Now, after the initial approval in the SPP General Assembly and the completion of all the procedures required for the international and national registration of the new title, we can begin this new era, as planned. At this moment, we must highlight the long journey envisaged and set in motion by different SPP directors and RPP editorial boards, like the publication in the English language, the PubMed indexation, the impact factor or the Elsevier edition, which are the main milestones. I think that as a scientific society we can be proud of such a fruitful and successful journey.

However, this achievement will demand from all of us a higher commitment, since there will certainly be a significant increase in the number of the manuscripts submitted to the journal and which will require more intense and meticulous work in their evaluation. We will need more associated editors and a renewal of the editorial board in order to manage in a timely manner all the work that we will have from now on.

However, we need to be aware of some clouds on the horizon, such as for instance the fact that the name Pulmonology is unknown, and, at least at the beginning, could be confusing for the international scientific community given the profusion of medical journals, usually called predatory journals, which are continuously being publicized on the web. Moreover, since the impact factor of a given year is a result of the number of cites obtained by a medical journal in the two previous years’ editions, the impact factor in 2018 will relate to RPP, in 2019 it will be divided between RPP and Pulmonology and only in 2020 will it finally be attributed just to Pulmonology. To overcome these difficulties, we must publicize this new title, always stressing the previous experience and background of RPP. Over the next two years we also have to provide Pulmonology with all the editorial resources required by a highly competitive international medical journal, that is, recruit new national and international members to the editorial board in order to provide the quality of leadership inherent in this editorial burden and to provide the conditions for an accurate evaluation of the manuscripts submitted to the journal, in order to conclude a successful transition when the first impact factor is attributed to Pulmonology.

Based on this previous long, hard and outstanding journey we will certainly succeed in this new challenging and stimulating purpose.