[Productivity of Spanish emergency physicians: comparison of the 5-year periods 2010-2014 and 2005-2009]

To study the publication productivity of Spanish emergency physicians in the 5-year period from 2010 through 2014 and compare it with the previous period (2005-2009).

Articles authored by emergency physicians affiliated with institutions in Spain were selected from the Science Citation Index-Expanded; conference presentations were excluded. We collected data for year of publication, author information, journal, the journal's impact factor (IF), type of article, cites received, and area of research. We searched at 2010-2014 period, and these data were compared with historic data from the 2005-2009 period.

A total of 1433 articles were published in 2010-2014; 52.4% were original research articles (56% more than in 2005-2009, P=.01). The mean journal IF associated with the publications was slightly higher in 2010-2014 (2.587 vs 2.483 for 2005-2009). The median was slightly lower (2.295 vs 3.085 in the earlier period), but the 90th percentile was higher (4.036 vs 3.085, P=0.01), reflecting an increase in the number of publications in journals with high IFs. Most articles continue to be published in Castilian Spanish (67.8%), although the percentage of articles published in English increased significantly, from 25.2% in the previous period to 32.1% in 2010-2014; P=.001). Scientific publications in emergency medicine come mainly from specialists working in hospital emergency departments (89%). Authors affiliated with a university are in the minority, although their percentage increased significantly from 10.9% in the previous period to 16.2% in the recent one (P=.001). Collaboration increased in the recent period in all categories: between hospitals in the same Spanish autonomous community (from 24.7% to 36%), in different communities (from 10.9% to 19%), or in different countries (from 2.3% to 8.4%) (P=.001, all comparisons). The most productive research areas were cardiovascular conditions (accounting for 13.1% of the publications), infectious diseases (13.0%), toxicology and pharmacology (9.2%), pediatric emergencies (8.0%), respiratory diseases (7.4%), cardiopulmonary resuscitation (6.7%), and management (6.0%). Catalonia produced the largest number of papers (427 [29.8%]). Hospital Clínic de Barcelona ranked first among hospitals publishing research, with 145 articles (11.4% of the total in this category); the emergency services of Madrid (SUMMA-112) ranked first among out-of-hospital research groups, with 43 publications (36.7% of the total in this category). Catalonia, Madrid, Castile-La Mancha, the Canary Islands, Murcia, the Balearic Islands, and La Rioja increased their contributions to Spanish productivity by 20% or more over their output in the earlier 5-year period. Nine of the 2010-2014 articles have already attracted enough cites to be considered citation classics.

The productivity of Spanish emergency physicians continued to grow at a good pace in the 2010-2014 period. Publications in journals with IFs increased and there were significant changes in the dynamics of publication and the subjects covered.