[An analysis on papers published by the National Institute of Parasitic Diseases in 2002-2006].

Objective: To partially evaluate the scientific and technological activities of the Institute of Parasitic Diseases, China CDC, through publication analysis.
Methods: Information on the papers published in the last 5 years was collected since the renaming of the Institute in 2002. Number, category and being cited frequency of the publications were analyzed using the data of 2002 as baseline.
Results: 272 papers were published at 48 national and international periodicals during 2002-2006. The total number, the number of papers published at the core journals and at the SCI journals all increased in the year 2003-2006. Publications on research, review and report occupied 54.8%, 36.0% and 15.4% respectively, covered schistosomiasis, malaria, echinococcosis, filariasis, visceral leishmaniasis, food-borne and soil-transmitted parasitic infections, and newly emerging parasites with 44.5% and 15.4% on schistosomiasis and malaria respectively. 87.9%, 11.0% and 1.1% of the articles were published at the national, international and local journals respectively. The balance rate for the trends of papers submitted in 2002 was 6.5%, and 10.2%-15.4% in 2003-2006. 34 of the 272 papers were included in SCI journals. Retrieval through the web of knowledge revealed that 187 citations were found in the SCI papers with an average of 5.5; 6 papers were cited for more than 9 times each, occupying 27.3% of the overall citations, the highest being 84 citations. There was an unbalanced distribution of the publications among the departments of the Institute.
Conclusion: The results indicate that the research direction and content are in line with the tasks of the Institute and with the scientific merits of disease control; the level of research is increasing and some of the publications exert certain impact at home and abroad.