INVESTIGATION IN RHEUMATOLOGY - ANALYSIS OF SPANISH DOCUMENTS PUBLISHED DURING 1990-1996 IN 9 FOREIGN SPECIALTY JOURNALS

Background. A relevant increase in the spanish biomedical production h as occurred in the last few years. The magnitude, evolution and charac teristics of the Spanish scientific production in Rheumatology is here analyzed through the published papers in foreign specialty journals. Methods. Location in spanish documents published from 1990 to 1996 in nine foreign rheumatology journals of great visibility in MEDLINE. Cla ssification of documents according to type of publication, specialty o f authors and type of design. Estimation of bibliometric and collabora tion indicators. Analysis of their evolution and comparison with data published for 1987. Results. The number of Spanish documents from 1990 to 1996 doubled and from 1987 to 1996 tripled, with a 54% increase fo r the four journals with more visibility. In 1996, the spanish documen ts reached 5% of the total of published documents in several journals. From 1990 to 1996 original papers increased almost four times more th an letters, the analytical studies increased almost eight times more t han descriptive studies, and the mean expected impact factor of the or iginals multiplied by 1.6. The published documents by spanish rheumato logists had a more favorable profile -higher ratios for originals: let ters, analytical studies: descriptive studies- than publications perfo rmed by other specialists in this area. The number of authors by docum ent (median) increased from 5 to 6 during the analyzed period. Seventy -two percent of documents was signed by more than one departament and 75% by only one institution. Conclusions. A relevant increase has occu rred in the number and quality spanish documents published in the rheu matology area during the last ten years. To note a lack of collaborati on between different institutions and few analytical studies of great complexity: cohort studies and controlled clinical trials.