Purpose: Corporate scientific activity lies at the heart of the modern academic institution, and yet field-specific estimates of institutional or departmental scholarly productivity are difficult to assess. The authors sought to estimate long-term and current departmental research efforts at residency-sponsoring US radiation oncology departments, using modifications of established bibliometric indices.
Methods: Bibliometric citation database searches were performed for all residency-affiliated academic radiation oncology departments and their component physician radiation oncology faculty members. Metrics based on publication, citation, and the Hirsch index (h-index) were calculated, and departments were ranked by departmental productivity from 1996 to 2007, as well as by current mean faculty bibliometric output.
Results: Seventy-eight academic radiation oncology departments and their component 826 radiation oncologist faculty members were analyzed bibliometrically. The average number of publications per department from 1996 to 2007 was 363.8, with a mean of 8,116.0 citations and a mean institutional h-index of 37.2. Departments at academic institutions demonstrated a grand mean of 41.0 publications, 709.0 citations, and an h-index of 7.6 as of fall 2007. A larger number of physician faculty members (>12) was associated with increased scholarly activity.
Conclusions: The use of quantitative metrics provides departments and researchers with a mechanism to evaluate collective scientific productivity and serves as an impetus for improved performance across the field.