A comprehensive study of published articles by members of SBMU and their citation status as reported by the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) from 1998-2007

Backgraound: The indexed scientific publication in valid information databases like ISI is an important scale for rating universities. Publication of scientific productions in these databases increases accessability, resulting in greater citation. In this survey, the status of publishing and citing of the SBMU (Shahid Beheshti Medical University) articles from 1997 to 2007 has been studied. The findings are expected to be useful for SBMU schedules and policy making decisions in future. This is a descriptive scientometric survey of all the articles published by SBMU members in the citation indexes of ISI from 1998 to 2007. The findings have been reported, using descriptive statistics. A total of 1431 articles were investigated. According to the results, the rate of SBMU articles has increased considerably in the study period. Most articles have been published in "American journal of Gastroenterology" and "Journal of Endourology" (each with 35 articles, comprising 2.5% of the articles). All of the articles were in English and most in the field of pharmacology & pharmacy. In 70% of the articles, SBMU researchers were the first author. Most rating citations belong to the articles published in 2006 while articles of 2003 have the highest rate of indexing. The citation diagram shows an increasing curve. The number of article publications and their citations has increased during 1997-2007 which may be an indicative of encouragements and supports provided for the researchers by the university.