Worldwide contribution of Indian authors in various anesthesia-related journals.

Sir,

Over the years, there is a continuing increase in the number of journals related to the field of anesthesia. Good quality articles are being submitted to anesthesia-related journals from all over the world. Indian authors have also increased their participation in submitting many articles on various sections. Though the contribution of Indian authors in international journals has increased over the years, the input still remains meager. There are roughly around 122 anesthesia and pain-related journals (indexed and nonindexed) worldwide. We searched for the contribution of Indian authors in some of the popular anesthesia journals such as British Journal of Anaesthesia (BJA), European Journal of Anaesthesiology (EJA), Canadian Journal of Anesthesiology (CJA), Pediatric Anesthesia (PA), Anaesthesia and Intensive Care (AIC), Anesthesia Analgesia (AA), and Journal of Neurosurgical Anesthesiology (JNSA). All the above journals are indexed by PubMed, the database, we searched. The country of origin of each corresponding author was retrieved. We used appropriate abbreviations of journals as suggested in PubMed along with search terms “India.” Randomized controlled trial (RCT) are one of the powerful tools in the field of modern clinical research in terms of the quality of evidence.[1] The highest level of evidence that can help in clinical practice comes from RCT.[23] However, other study designs, for example, Cohort, case–control, cross-sectional, case studies, or series, can also provide useful information in some cases for clinical decision making. RCTs and systematic reviews of RCTs form the strongest structure of clinical evidence.[456] The RCT is considered the gold standard for a clinical trial. We then collected the total number of RCT in each journal after applying search filter “RCT.” A total of 16,932 articles was published in BJA (since 1946), 4009 articles in EJA (since 1984), 6882 articles in CJA (since 1987), 4318 articles in PA (since 1995), 6152 articles in AIC (since 1972), 24493 articles in AA (since 1945), and 1470 articles in JNSA (since 1989). The search was conducted on the January 22, 2015, showed a very little contribution from Indian authors: 0.33% in BJA, 0.94% in EJA, 0.78% in CJA, 2.8% in PA, 0.48% in AA, 6.8% in JNSA, and 1.6% in AIC, respectively. Furthermore, the contribution of Indian authors in RCT so was again found to be very minimal: 8% in BJA, 17% in EJA, 13% in CJA, 17% in PA, 20% in AA, 15% in ANIC, and 10% in JNSA, respectively.

There is a strong need in the modern day anesthesiology practice to bring about a large social and clinical change in the methodology of anesthesiology research. The qualitative research has to be given due respect with support from a well-designed theoretical framework with practical feasibility. In addition, better awareness of research plays an important part in possibly influencing the younger generations to achieve their aim in the anesthesia literature. Precautions have to be exercised regarding the quality of academic and research work being submitted for publication as the quantitative flood can possibly drown the real progress made by the speciality. That is how the developing nations can make a significant turnaround in the world anesthesia literature. Since, we have used only one database, our results to be interpreted cautiously.

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Conflicts of interest

There are no conflicts of interest.