A novel indictor of the scientific quality in academic medical researchers

Abstract

The primary goal of the presented study was finding an optimal evaluation apparatus for objective, qualitative assessment of research outputs. An index, called Scientific Quality Index (SQI), was employed and used according to the following formula: the percent of papers cited ≥10 times vs. all the published papers, including those with no citation + the mean number of citations, regarding all the published papers, including those with no citation. Self-citations and citations of all co-authors are excluded. The results of analyses of the scientific output of 33 authors have been presented. Using SQI, six authors (18.2%) did not change their initial positions, according to the Hirsch (h) index, twelve authors (36.4%) noted a decrease, and the other 15 (45.4%) improved their position. SQI significantly correlated with the h-index (r=0.74, p<0.000001), the total citation number (r=0.63, p<0.0001), the number of cited papers ≥10 times (r=0.70, p<0.00001), the percent of cited papers ≥10 times (r=0.97, p<0.000001) and the mean number of citations per paper (r=0.84, p<0.000001). Therefore, SQI expresses the overall quality of scientific output of an individual author, being strongly related to the percent of cited papers ≥10 times and the mean citations per paper. The output size, measured by the total number of publications does not play any major role. The number of citations and the number of papers cited ≥10 times were less important. In conclusion, SQI may be regarded as a useful tool in attempts to establish objective quality of scientific output in case of individual author.