RESEARCH FUNDING IN THE 4 MAJOR EMERGENCY-MEDICINE JOURNALS

The objective of this survey was to determine the percentage of unfund ed studies published in the four major emergency medicine journals and to examine the sources in funded studies. This study was a retrospect ive survey of all issues of the four general emergency medicine journa ls in 1994. Funding was categorized as public national, private, inter national, institutional, or unfunded. The total funding and sources we re recorded for each of the four journals. Confidence intervals (CIs) were determined to compare the percent of funded Versus unfunded artic les. Overall, significantly more of the emergency medicine articles in the four journals were unfunded (63% unfunded [95% CI = 56.7-69.1]; 3 7% funded [95% CI = 30.9-43.3]). The sources of funding for each of th e journals varied, with most being private (45%). In conclusion unfund ed research remains a major source of emergency medicine literature in the four main emergency medicine journals. Copyright (C) 1997 by W.B. Saunders Company.