Bibliometrics indicators in the Caribbean islands: French West Indies authorship analyzed from 1989 to 2018

Abstract

BackgroundBibliometrics are mathematical methods used in various scientific domains to measure scientific output based on the number of publications, the prestige of the journal, and the number of citations of the research after its publication. To the best of our knowledge, only a few bibliometric studies have been performed in the Caribbean or the French West Indies. The aim of this study was to quantify the collaborations and scientific output between the two university teaching hospitals of Martinique and Guadeloupe, at the regional, national and international level.MethodA bibliometrics analysis was performed from the international databases Web of Science and PubMed, for the period from 1989 to 2018 inclusive (30 years). Three types of bibliometric indicators were used, namely quantitative indicators, performance indicators, and organisation-specific indicators. Affiliations of the first and last authors were identified from PubMed. Between 2014 and 2018, we recorded the affiliations of all authors (from the first to the last author) who collaborated on an article with the University Hospital of either Martinique of GuadeloupeResultsBetween 1989 and 2018, a total of 1,522 indexed articles were published with at least one author affiliated to either the University Hospital of Martinique (N=827) or the University Hospital of Guadeloupe (N=685). The majority of articles for both hospitals were in category Q1 (35.8% for Martinique, and 35.2% for Guadeloupe). In Martinique, over the last 30 years, the 3 main research areas have been clinical neurology, ophthalmology and surgery, together representing 28.7% of all research areas, with the highest number of articles published in the field of clinical neurology (n=81). In the University Hospital of Guadeloupe, the area of hematology was largely represented, with 79 articles published. For both hospitals, the first and last authors of the articles published were mainly from mainland France, and from either Martinique or Guadeloupe university hospitalConclusionThis quantitative and qualitative analysis shows the development of medical and scientific research in Martinique and Guadeloupe over the last three decades, as well as the extent of their collaborative partnerships at national and international level.