CHEST is the publishing program of the American College of Chest Physicians (ACCP), the Glenview, Illinois society founded in 1935 for clinicians in pulmonary, critical care, and sleep medicine. The society publishes three peer-reviewed journals - CHEST, CHEST Critical Care, and CHEST Pulmonary - all produced with Elsevier on the society's behalf. This is a small, focused portfolio rather than a broad catalog: if your paper is clinical chest medicine, one of these three is likely the right home; if it is basic respiratory science, it probably is not.

The flagship journal began in 1935 as Diseases of the Chest and was renamed CHEST in 1970 as the field widened beyond tuberculosis. It remains the society's flagship monthly and one of the most-cited clinical journals in respiratory and critical care medicine. The two newer titles, both launched in 2023, are fully open access and were created to give the society gold-OA venues alongside the hybrid flagship. This guide covers scope, open access and APCs, peer review, and how to submit.

• CHEST (ISSN 0012-3692, est. 1935 as Diseases of the Chest) - monthly; original clinical research, reviews, commentary, and the society's clinical practice guidelines across pulmonary, critical care, and sleep medicine. Indexed in MEDLINE/PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science, and consistently Q1 in its categories.
• CHEST Critical Care (ISSN 2949-7884, launched 2023) - fully open access; clinical research for critical care clinicians, indexed in DOAJ.
• CHEST Pulmonary (ISSN 2949-7892, launched 2023) - fully open access; clinical research across pulmonary and sleep medicine, indexed in DOAJ.

All three are published by Elsevier Inc. on behalf of the American College of Chest Physicians, so Elsevier's author-facing policies (licensing, waivers, sharing) apply, while editorial control sits with the society's editorial boards.

Notes on cost: Elsevier applies Research4Life waivers and discounts automatically when every author is based in an eligible country, and the society advertises a discount for CHEST members (commonly quoted at 20%). Prices are revised and are quoted to you personally at acceptance through Elsevier's author system, so treat the figures above as indicative and check the current price list before you submit. Publishing in CHEST without choosing OA costs nothing - the subscription route remains free to authors.

Whether an Elsevier read-and-publish agreement covers your APC depends on your institution: society-owned titles are frequently carved out of those deals, so confirm with your librarian or the ESAC registry rather than assuming coverage. Green open access is available through Elsevier's self-archiving terms, which set an embargo per title for the accepted manuscript.

All three journals use single-anonymized peer review: reviewers see author identities, authors do not see reviewer identities. The flagship is fast at the front end - the society reports a median time to first decision of roughly three weeks - which in practice means a high volume of editorial triage before external review. The two open-access titles run the same editorial model with their own boards and editors-in-chief, and each maintains standard Elsevier policies on competing interests, authorship, and data availability.

1. Pick the journal. Match scope first, then decide whether you need immediate open access; that choice usually decides between the flagship and the two OA titles.
2. Read the Guide for Authors for the specific journal - article types, word limits, and structured-abstract rules differ between them.
3. Format your references in AMA style (numbered, superscript citations), which is the house style across the CHEST journals.
4. Submit through Editorial Manager - editorialmanager.com/chest, editorialmanager.com/chest-critical-care, or editorialmanager.com/chest-pulmonary.
5. Handle the APC at acceptance. Only accepted papers are quoted a charge; nothing is payable at submission.

The American College of Chest Physicians is a COPE member and the journals follow COPE guidance on corrections, retractions, and misconduct investigations. Expect ICMJE-aligned authorship and disclosure requirements, trial registration for clinical trials, and standard reporting-guideline compliance (CONSORT, STROBE, PRISMA). Data-sharing statements are requested in line with Elsevier and ICMJE practice; check the individual journal's policy page for the current wording.