TY - JOUR T1 - International gastroenterology research: subject areas, impact, and funding JF - Gut JO - Gut SP - 295 LP - 302 DO - 10.1136/gut.49.2.295 VL - 49 IS - 2 AU - G Lewison AU - J Grant AU - P Jansen Y1 - 2001/08/01 UR - http://gut.bmj.com/content/49/2/295.abstract N2 - AIMS To examine the volume and potential impact of gastroenterology research outputs from 1985 to 1998 from 14 developed countries; the overlap with research in cancer, infectious diseases, and genetics; and the funding sources for this research. To determine if countries' research outputs correlated with their burden of corresponding diseases and inputs to their research.METHODS Selective retrieval of papers from the Science Citation Index and manual look up of a sample to determine funding sources. Classification of journals by four categories of research level (clinical/basic) and potential impact (low/high).RESULTS Gastroenterology represents about 8% of world biomedical research but over 11% in Italy, Japan, and Spain. Its potential impact is highest (but declining) for the USA. It has increased noticeably in most European countries, particularly in Finland. Gastroenterology research has become more clinical in Japan, Spain, Australia, and the Netherlands but more basic in Canada, Germany, Finland, Israel, and South Africa. Funding comes primarily from national governments, followed by national private non-profit sources and industry but little industrial funding occurs in some countries. There is a strong and positive correlation between reported deaths from gastrointestinal neoplasms and countries' outputs of research in gastrointestinal oncology.CONCLUSIONS Bibliometric analysis can reveal differences between countries in their research in a subject when a common methodology is applied to an international database. Variations in research methods in different countries can plausibly explain some of the variation in the potential impact of the work.Anumber of authors per paperC0–4five year citation countCFcalibration factorDnumber of addresses per paperFnumber of funders per paperGASTRgastrointerology (filter)GENETgenetics (filter)ICDInternational Classification of DeathsINFECinfection (filter)NFPprivate non-profitONCOLoncology (filter)PICpotential impact categoryRLresearch level (clinical to basic)SCIScience Citation Index ER -