Objectives: To perform a bibliometric evaluation of publications from European Union (EU) countries in the international urological journals between 2000-2005 according to their national origin and in relation to international context.
Methods: Articles except reviews, editorials, letters, and reports published during 2000-2005 in 19 international urological journals were screened using Web of Science database. The total number of publications and the cumulative impact factor were determined for the first 15 EU member states (EU15), the USA, and the world. These data were related for every country to the population size and the socio-economic indicators gross domestic product, gross domestic expenditure on research and experimental development, and expenditure on health care.
Results: A total of 19.709 articles were published of which 6.878 (34.9%) came from the EU15 countries and 7.927 (40.2%) from the USA. About 15% of all papers from the EU15 countries were in collaboration with USA researchers. In the EU, the number of publications and the cumulative impact factor were dominated by United Kingdom, Germany, and Italy with about 52% of all papers and 50% of the cumulative impact factor. If adjusted for demographic and socio-economic factors the smaller countries Austria, Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands, and Sweden (alphabetical order) revealed a distinctly higher publication rate.
Conclusions: This study based on bibliometric analyses in urological journals demonstrated a feasible solution to validate and compare the contribution of the various EU countries towards the urological research.