A bibliometric analysis of geographic disparities in the authorship of leading medical journals

BackgroundIt has previously been reported that authors from developing countries are underrepresented in medical journals. Here, we aimed to build a comprehensive landscape of the geographical representation in medical research publications.MethodsWe collected bibliometric data of original research articles (n = 10,558) published between 2010 and 2019 in five leading medical journals and geolocated these by the institute of the corresponding authors. We introduced two simple metrics, the International Research Impact and the Domestic Self-Citation Index, to assess publishing and citing patterns by cities and countries.ResultsWe show that only 32 countries published more than 10 publications in 10 years equaling 98.9% of all publications. English-speaking countries USA (48.2%), UK (15.9%), Canada (5.3%), and Australia (3.2%) are most represented, but with a declining trend in recent years. When normalized to citation count, 9/32 countries published >= 10% more than expected. In total, 85.7% of the publication excess originate from the USA and UK. We demonstrate similar geographical bias at the municipal level. Finally, we discover that journals more commonly publish studies from the country in which the journal is based and authors are more likely to cite work from their own country.ConclusionsThe study reveals Anglocentric dominance, domestic preference, but increased geographical representation in recent years in medical publishing. Similar audits could mitigate possible national and regional disparities in any academic field. Geographical representation in authorships of research articles is insufficiently understood. We analyzed data from over 10,000 research articles published between 2010-2019 in top medical journals. Anglocentric countries (USA, UK, Canada, and Australia) accounted for most publications, but their proportion has recently declined. When considering citations, i.e. formal references connecting new findings to observations from previously published articles, 1/3 of the studied countries published >= 10% more articles than expected. When publishing and citing articles, journals and researchers tended to favor publications from their own countries. While some improvement in geographical representation has occurred, our findings expose an Anglocentric bias and national preference, which might bias medical publishing. The approach used in this study may be used in future efforts to monitor geographical representation in publication authorships. Bruck examines geographical representation in the authorship of leading medical journal publications between 2010 and 2019. While still dominated by authors from English-speaking countries, there is increased representation of authors from other countries over this period.