Comparison of specialized medical journals among Iran and selected countries

Objective (s): This was a comparative scientometric study of specialty journals, impact factor, immediacy factor and cited life-half of Iranian journals with selected countries in order to determine present condition of the Iran. All Iranian and selected countries ISI indexed journals were entered into the presnet comparative study. A checklist including country, journal title, journal subject, ISSN, ISI indexing year, impact factor, immediacy factor and journals cited life-half for years of 2009 and 2010, was applied for data collection. The journals were scored on a 3-point index for the first, second and third rank in each category. Ranking was carried out based on total score achievd by each country. Three countries (Palestine, Kyrgyzstan and Afghanistan) did not have any specialized journal in the field of medical sciences or other sciences. However, Turkey, Pakistan and Iran had 448 (31.1%), 285(19.8%) and 185(12.8%) specialzed journals of total of 1440 journals in 2009 and 468 (31.05%), 291 (19.3%) and 203 (13.5%) of total of 1507 journals in 2010 respectively. Turkey, Pakistan and Iran with 22, 16 and 9 points were the first three countries among 25 countries studied. Paying attention to scientometrics such as papers permanent availability, quality and quantity of papers and ISI indexing are important issues for improving the present status of specialized journals in Iran.