GASTROENTEROLOGY RESEARCH IN THE UNITED-KINGDOM - FUNDING SOURCES ANDIMPACT

Aims-To determine the sources of funding for UK gastroenterology resea rch papers and the relative impact of papers funded by different group s and of unfunded ones. Methods-UK gastroenterology papers from 1985-9 4 were selectively retrieved from the Science Citation Index by means of a specially constructed filter based on their title keywords and jo urnal names. They were looked up in libraries to determine their fundi ng sources and these, together with their numbers of authors, numbers of addresses, and research category (clinical/basic) were considered a s input parameters to the research. Output parameters analysed were me an journal impact category, citation counts by papers, and the frequen cy of citation by a US patent. Results-Gastroenterology papers compris e about 7% of all UK biomedical research and 46% of them have no ackno wledged funding source. One quarter of the papers acknowledged governm ent support, and a similar fraction a private, non-profit source; 11% were funded by the pharmaceutical industry The papers acknowledging fu nding had significantly more impact than the others on all three measu res. The citing patents had six times more UK inventors than the avera ge for all US Patent and Trademark Office patents in the relevant clas ses and were mostly generic in application. Conclusion-The variation i n impact of papers funded by different sources can mostly be explained by a simple model based on the input factors (numbers of funding bodi es, numbers of authors, numbers of addresses, and research type). The national science base in gastroenterology is important for the underpi nning of UK invented patents citing to it.