Accuracy of references: comparison between two premier Pakistani medical journals

Objective: To compare two premier Pakistani medical journals for errors in references of original articles published in the year 2008. Methods: All original articles of the Journal of Pakistan Medical Association and the Journal of the College of Physicians and Surgeons Pakistan published in 2008 were included in the study. References pertaining to journals were included in the study, whereas references pertaining to other sources such as books, internet articles, websites and newspapers were excluded. Errors were categorised into author error, article title error, journal title error, year of publication error, volume error and page number error. The data was analysed through SPSS 16.0. Results: References from 200 original articles (100 each from both journals) were evaluated. Only 19 (9.5%) articles were found to be free of error with no significant difference between the two journals. On evaluation of 3783 references, the overall reference error was found to be 1015 (26.8%): 531 (31%) in JPMA and 484 (23.4%) in JCPSP. The author error was the commonest error among these references (n=490; 13%), followed by page error (n=297; 7.9%), article title error (n=222; 5.9%), and journal title error (n=189; 5%). JCPSP had statistically significant more article errors, whereas JPMA had statistically significant more journal title and page errors. Conclusion: Reference errors constitute an avoidable but substantial lapse of medical literature. The magnitude of reference errors is much higher than expected.