Economic and geographical disparities in global contribution to open access publishing in anaesthesiology: A...

Open access (OA) publishing improved the reach of scientific discoveries, particularly among researchers in lower-income countries. However, OA publishing still has a global imbalance. This bibliometric analysis evaluates anaesthesia OA journals to explore geographical and economic disparities in publication volume.

We queried the Directory of Open Access Journals for OA anaesthesia-related journals between 2014 and 2024. Data from the included journals were analysed using Scopus, from which we extracted the year of publication and the corresponding author's affiliation. Additional metrics were obtained from each journal website. Countries were then categorised by income level and geographical region.

Thirty-four anaesthesiology OA journals were analysed, encompassing 27,634 publications from 120 countries. The leading contributors were India (23.96%), the USA (14.98%) and China (6.54%). Low-income countries accounted for 0.37% of total publications, followed by upper-middle-income (17.97%), lower-middle-income (29.07%), and high-income (52.54%) countries. The geographical distribution of publication volume was as follows: Southeast Asia (25.38%), Europe (23.18%), Western Pacific (18.92%), Americas (23.91%), Eastern Mediterranean (8.03%) and Africa (0.59%). Nineteen journals required a mean article processing charge (APC) of US $2,164.89, accounting for 51.89% of the total publications. India ranked first in non-APC journals, while the USA led in APC journals.

While OA publishing enhances accessibility for readers, it still presents challenges for authors, particularly in economically disadvantaged countries. Significant geographical and economic disparities exist in OA publication volume, likely due to limited investment and structural barriers in lower-income countries.