The impact of Greek publications on the international literature by scientific category

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the penetration of Greek publications in the international literature by scientific category. METHOD: We used the publications database of the Institute for Scientific Information® (ISI), the search engine that is available through its web pages as well as a re-tabulation of the 120 scientific categories of ISI into 50 broader categories. We counted the publications that appeared during the decade 1994-2003 in the 30 journals of each category with the highest impact factor (IF) and, among them, the proportion of the Greek publications. A more valid comparison between scientific categories was attempted using a new index, the index of Greek contribution (IGC), that takes into account the relative number (‰) of Greek publications among the sum of publications of each category in the 30 most prominent journals as well as the journals' IFs. RESULTS: The 20528 Greek publications represent the 4.73‰ of all the 4,340,793 publications appearing in the above ISI journals during the decade 1994-2003. The distribution of Greek publications by scientific category indicates that more than 55% of the publications originated from medical specialties. Among them, Oncology and Heart Diseases were the specialties with the highest international penetration. CONCLUSIONS: The presence of Greek scientific publications in the international literature is noticeable, if the population of the country is taken in account, but further improvement is necessary. Among all publication in the international scientific literature, the ones with medical content represent more than 55% of the total or the quality adjusted total.