As of 2022[update] the editor-in-chief is Carl Kirton[1] and it is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.

In 2009 the journal was selected as one of the "100 Most Influential Journals in Biology and Medicine in the Last 100 Years" by the Biomedical and Life Sciences Division of the Special Libraries Association.

[2] The journal was established in 1900 as the official journal of the Associated Alumnae of Trained Nurses of the United States which later became the American Nurses Association.

[3] Isabel Hampton Robb, Lavinia Dock, Mary E. P. Davis and Sophia Palmer are credited with founding the journal,[4] the latter serving as the first editor.

[5] Other editors have included Mary May Roberts (1921–1949), Nell V. Beeby (1949–1956), Jeanette V. White (1956–1957), Edith P. Lewis (1957–1959), Barbara G. Schutt (1959–1971), Thelma M. Schorr (1971–1981), Mary B. Mallison (1981–1993), Lucille A. Joel (1993–1998), Diana J. Mason (1998–2009), Maureen S. Kennedy (2009–2022), and Carl Kirton (2022-present) [6][7][8] The journal was originally published by J.