It covers various aspects of medicine in an academic settings like education and training issues; health and science policy; institutional policy, management, and values; research practice; and clinical practice.

[1] The journal was established in 1926 as the Bulletin of the Association of American Medical Colleges.

It was renamed Journal of the Association of American Medical Colleges in 1929.

[2] In 2015, the journal was ranked one of the top five medical education journals that received attention in social media sources, such as Twitter and Facebook.

Laura Weiss Roberts is the present editor-in-chief, appointed in 2019.