Summary
Research output and impact of a group of emergency physicians selected according to research career criteria
Burbano P, Martín-Sánchez FJ, Burillo-Putze G, Fernández Pérez C, Del Prado González N, Miró O
Affiliation of the authors
Grupo de Investigación Urgencias: Procesos y Patologías (UPPs), IDIBAPS, Barcelona, Spain. Secretaría de Educación Superior, Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación (SENESCYT) Quito, Ecuador. Servicio de Urgencias, Hospital Clínico San Carlos, Madrid, Spain. Instituto de Investigación Sanitaria del Hospital San Carlos, Madrid, Spain. Servicio de Urgencias, Hospital Universitario de Canarias, Tenerife, Spain. Universidad Europea de Canarias, Tenerife, Spain. Unidad de Investigación, Servicio de Medicina Preventiva, Hospital Clínico San Carlos, Madrid, Spain. Universidad Complutense, Madrid, Spain. Área de Urgencias, Hospital Clínic, Barcelona, Spain.
DOI
Quote
Burbano P, Martín-Sánchez FJ, Burillo-Putze G, Fernández Pérez C, Del Prado González N, Miró O. Research output and impact of a group of emergency physicians selected according to research career criteria. Emergencias. 2013;25:245-54
Summary
Objectives: To investigate bibliometric indicators of research output, or productivity, and
impact of selected Spanish emergency physicians who engage in research and to
describe the behavior of these indicators for this group of researchers as a whole.
Methods: Pilot study exploring indicators for a group of 24 emergency physicians who
engage in research. The physicians were elected from among members of the editorial
board and peer reviewers of the journal Emergencias. All had been publishing papers for
at least 10 years and had authored at least 20 papers, including 5 in the last 3 years. The
following information was collected for each author: publications in journals included in
Science Citation Index Expanded; duration of career in medical research; number of
publications as the output indicator; and number of cites, accumulated impact factor,
and h-index as the impact indicators. These indicators were calculated for each year of
the physicians research careers. The results, including change in the indicators over
time, were analyzed for individuals and for the group as a whole by means of both linear
and polynomial regression models.
Results: The physicians had been engaged in research for a mean (SD) of 19 (7) years
(range, 10-35 years). The associations between years of experience and the indicators of
output and impact were not significant. Polynomial regression models fit the changes in
these indicators over time better than linear models. Analyzed individually the R2 values
were always over 0.90 for all indicators in polynomial modeling; for the group as a
whole, the h-index showed the best fit (R2 = 0.54). The h-index behaved differently for
researchers with up to 20 years of experience (better fit, R2 = 0.71 as well as accelerated
increase) and for those with more than 20 years of experience (R2 = 0.61).
Conclusions: It is possible to model changes in the output and impact factors of Spanish
emergency physicians who engage in research. The models can be used in the future to
compare the behavior of these research indicators with those of other Spanish research
groups or those of emergency physicians engaging in research in other countries.