Revista Información Científica (Oct 2020)
Analysis of the articles about COVID-19 published on online magazines issued by Cuban medical schools
Abstract
Introduction: the COVID-19-related infodemic makes necessary to evaluate all the indicators published and generated by science. Objective: to describe scientific articles about COVID-19 published on Cuban online medical school magazines. Method: an observational, descriptive and bibliometric study was carried through, checking on articles about COVID-19 on Cuban medical online magazines in the period January-June 2020. Every article about COVID-19 published in the 15 magazines currently online was downloaded in the same language and format they were available, taking into account the number of the volume, issue and section where they were published; the authors and the institutions they were affiliated to; place of origin and how many bibliographical references they had. Price´s transience index and variation rates were calculated. Results: 80 articles about COVID-19 were identified, 33.75% of them published in the magazine Revista Habanera de Ciencias Médica. Original articles prevailed (38.75%); 28.75% of them were written in Spanish and English as well, and 72.50% had multiple authors (244 of them, from 99 institutions). 1425 references were made, with a Price´s transience index of 0.86. 75 articles presented at least one quotation, and 75 citations were received. The number of publications peaked in May, with a variation rate of 80.95% compared to April. Conclusions: there is a low number of articles about COVID-19 in the online medical magazines issued by Cuban medicine schools, most of them in the on the magazines Revista Habanera de Ciencias Médicas and Medisur. The provinces and institutions with a higher number of articles coincide with the ones with the top publishing magazines.
