Research in Pharmacy Schools of India: A Study Based on Scopus Database

Research output (1947 to the end of 2009) from Indian pharmacy schools, (including departments of pharmaceutical sciences operating within universities) was gathered with the help of three online resources namely Scopus, and the official websites of Pharmacy Council of India (PCI) and All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE). AICTE provides a list of 1083 approved pharmacy colleges with a total of 62797 undergraduate and 8013 postgraduate admissions per year. Scopus lists a total of about 10680 publications with a total of 45010 citations (1947 to December 2009) from Indian pharmacy schools (excluding National Institute of Pharmaceutical Education and Research). The annual rate of increase in publications peaked at 30 to 40% between 2005 and 2007. Karnataka came first with more than 16% of the country's publications and over 13% of citations. The top ten schools bagged about 52% publications and 70% citations. The break-up data placed Harisingh Gour University, Sagar, on top for the maximum number of publications and Panjab University for the highest citations as well as citations per paper. Only 21 papers from Indian Pharmacy schools have a total citation count of more than 100. The current trend holds promise for rapid growth, although quality of publications has not yet become the priority of most researchers.