Research Publication Rates Are Age- and Era-Dependent for Radiation Oncologists From Highly Ranked NCI-Designated...

Quantitative bibliometrics are increasingly used to evaluate faculty research productivity. This study benchmarks publication rates for radiation oncologists from highly ranked National Cancer Institute-designated cancer centers and reveals how productivity changes over the arc of a career and of the field over time.

Peer-reviewed articles from 1970 to 2022 were obtained using Scopus for the 348 radiation oncologists listed as faculty for the top 10 cancer hospitals ranked by US News and World Report in 2022. Bibliometrics were analyzed for authorships (A˙), authorships where the individual was first or last author (F˙L), the monograph equivalent of authorships (M˙E), h-index, and ha-index (an analog to h-index using M˙E in place of publications). Career start was defined as the year of first publication. Bibliometric inflation was explored by analyzing authorship and bibliometric changes between 1990 and 2022.

Publication rates peak, with as much as a 500% increase, 20 to 25 years from the start of a career before declining until retirement. At career ages of 1, 10, 20, and 30 years, the median bibliometrics were A˙ = (1.5, 4.1, 6.5, 7.0) year^-1, F˙L = (0.5, 0.9, 1.2, 0.6) year^-1, M˙E= (0.2, 0.5, 0.7, 0.8) year^-1, h-index = (1, 12, 22, 47), and ha-index = (0.4, 4.4, 6.9, 18.4). With regards to authorship patterns across eras, the median number of authors listed per paper increased by 240% between 1990 and 2022. Meanwhile, research productivity per individual as measured by F˙L and M˙E was unchanged.

The research publication rates of the median radiation oncologist change substantially over the course of their career. Productivity improves steadily for more than 2 decades before peaking and declining. The culture of authorship has also changed between 1990 and 2022. The number of authors listed per paper has trended upwards, which has an inflationary effect on the number of authorships and h-index. Meanwhile, the rate of manuscripts published per faculty has not changed.