Bibliometric analysis of the official journals of internal medicine societies in Europe

Abstract

Introduction: Bibliometrics evaluates the quality of biomedical journals. The aim of this study has been to compare the main bibliometric indexes of the official journals of scientific societies of Internal Medicine in Europe.

Material and methods: Bibliometric information was obtained from the Web of Science (WoS) and Scopus databases. Both impact metrics (Journal Impact Factor [JIF], CiteScore) and normalized metrics (Journal Citation Indicator [JCI], Normalized Eigenfactor, Source Normalized Impact per Paper [SNIP] and SCImago Journal Rank [SJR]) of the journals for the year 2022 were analyzed, and their evolution over the last decade was described.

Results: Twenty-three official journals from 33 scientific societies were evaluated. Eight journals were included in WoS and 11 in Scopus. The best positioned journals in 2022 were: 1) European Journal of Internal Medicine, which ranked in the first quartile (Q1) for JIF, CiteScore and JCI metrics, exceeding values of 1 in Normalized Eigenfactor and SNIP metrics; 2) Internal and Emergency Medicine, with Q1 for CiteScore and JCI metrics, and with values >1 in Normalized EigenFactor and SNIP metrics; 3) Polish Archives of Internal Medicine, with Q1 for JCI metrics; 4) Revista Clínica Española, with Q2 for JIF, CiteScore and JCI metrics; and 5) Acta Medica Belgica, with Q2 for CiteScore and JCI metrics. These journals increased their impact metrics in the last 3 years, in parallel with the COVID pandemic.

Conclusions: Five official journals of European Internal Medicine societies, including Revista Clínica Española, meet high quality standards.

Keywords: Bibliometrics; Bibliometría; Biomedical journals; Factor de impacto; Impact factor; Internal medicine; Medicina interna; Revistas biomédicas.