Biomedical and health research productivity in Marrakesh

Abstract

Abstract Introduction: Despite the importance of assessing research productivity and impact, such data are lacking in resource-limited settings, where research faces substantial challenges.The aim of this study was to assess biomedical and health sciences publications of authors from Marrakesh in PubMed-indexed peer-reviewed journals from 2015 to 2019. Materials and Methods: This was a bibliometric study. Relevant papers were searched in PubMed and examined. Collected data included the authors’ information (affiliation and collaborations), articles’ characteristics (such as record type and study design), and the journals’ characteristics (language, open access, and impact factor).Statistical analyses were descriptive using mainly counts and percentages. Results: A total of 494 authors published 715 manuscripts with an average number of publications per author of 1.4 ± 0.9 (mean ± standard deviation). More than half of the authors (55.2%) were affiliated with Moroccan University Hospitals. International collaboration was recorded in 31% of the papers. Half of the articles (49.7%) were original articles, and more than one-third were case reports. Among the original articles, the most commonly used study designs were cross-sectional studies and case series (24.2% and 23.6%, respectively). More than half of the articles were published in English, and 47.1% were published in open-access journals. Conclusion: The results emphasize the patterns of research productivity in our context, including limited scientific evidence and insufficient collaborative research projects. There is a need to promote research and improve its quality in resource-limited settings to enhance its impact on population health through integrated research–capacity-building initiatives. The following core competencies are addressed in this article: Medical knowledge.