Publication rate of abstracts presented at the 2010 Canadian Ophthalmological Society Annual Meeting

Objective: To evaluate the publication rate of submitted abstracts accepted for presentation at the 2010 Canadian Ophthalmological Society (COS) Annual Meeting in peer-reviewed journals. Design: A retrospective analysis and literature search of abstracts presented at the 2010 COS Annual Meeting. Methods: Abstracts accepted as an oral presentation or poster from the 2010 COS Annual Meeting were tabulated by type of presentation (oral vs poster), subspecialty, study design, number of authors, and principal investigator's institution. A PubMed search was conducted for each abstract by key word, first author, and last author. The year of publication, journal, and impact factor were recorded for identified publications. Publication rate was calculated by type of presentation, subspecialty, study design, number of authors, and institution. Results: A total of 175 abstracts were presented at the 2010 COS Annual Meeting. There were 105 oral (60%) and 70 poster (40%) presentations. The overall publication rate was 45.7%; 49.5% for oral presentations and 40.0% for posters. Cornea (57.6%) and public health (54.5%) had the highest publication rates of all subspecialties. Randomized control trials (71.4%) and cohort studies (70.0%) had higher publication rates than other study designs. Overall, 28.8% of abstracts were published in the Canadian Journal of Ophthalmology. The average impact factor of all publications was 2.73. Conclusion: Of abstracts presented at the 2010 COS Annual Meeting, 45.7% were published within 5 years after the conference. This publication rate is within the upper end of previously reported meeting publication rates for medical societies.