Abstract

Clinical Neuroscience Research in Saudi Arabia: A Bibliometric Appraisal of Productivity and Worldwide Ranking

Objectives: To assess the performance of clinical neuroscience research in Saudi Arabia by determining its worldwide ranking and by considering its position in the context of five country-specific characteristics. Methods: Scimago Journal and Country Rank (SJR) were used to determine Saudi Arabia’s worldwide ranking in clinical neuroscience during 1996- 2018. The country’s annual productivity was correlated with the median output for the worldwide top 50 countries. The data were also correlated with five country-specific characteristics and examined statistically. Results: Saudi Arabia’s productivity and rankings were total documents: 2,032 (rank 38), total cites: 20,337 (rank 40) and cites per document: 10.01 (rank 132). The country’s annual output correlated significantly with the median for the top 50 ranking countries in total documents and cites per document but not in total cites. Four of the five country-specific characteristics correlated significantly with two or three of the bibliometric indicators. Saudi Arabia’s country-specific characteristics rankings were GDP per capita: 26, the percentage spent on research and development: 41-42, number of clinical neuroscience journals enlisted in SJR: 22-31, and number of universities amongst the world top 500: 22-28. Conclusions: The steady annual increase in Saudi Arabia’s clinical neuroscience total documents is encouraging. Allowing for the country’s specific characteristics, its rankings may be considered below expectation. Saudi Arabia’s relatively small total cites number and low cites per document rank reflect the country’s researchers publishing in low impact journals. Saudi Arabia needs to improve the quality of its research and to undertake more international collaborative research.

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