Annual International Geographic Medicine Congress Meetings in Shiraz, Iran: Publication Rates during 1999-2006

The present study aimed to examine which portion of abstracts presented between 1999 to 2006 at Annual International Geographic Medicine Congress meetings in Shiraz, Iran, were published during 1999-2006, and to identify factors affecting publication rate of those abstracts. Two hundred fifty abstracts were reviewed and categorized according to the type of presentation, study design, sample size, main findings, source of funding, and statistical significance of the results. Principal investigators of those abstracts were provided with a questionnaire inquiring whether their abstracts lead to full-length publications in peer-reviewed journals indexed under PubMed. One hundred twenty five authors responded to the questionnaire. The publication rate of the meeting presentations was found 27.2%. Statistically significant associations were found between publication rate and certain characteristics of the presentations including type of the study, achieving positive results, and conducting multi-center trial funded by a sponsor. Insufficient fluency in English, insufficient time to prepare the manuscript, and assuming journals are unlikely to accept those studies were most common reasons for not preparing or submitting the manuscripts. The publication rate of research studies presented in this annual scientific meeting in Shiraz, Iran, is lower than many similar meetings in other countries.