Twelve years of scientific production on Medline by Latin American spine surgeons.

Background: Despite the small contribution of LA in the Science Citation Index (SCI), a growing contribution by LA research to international literature has been observed in recent years.
Study Design: Systematic review.
Purpose: To evaluate the scientific contribution of Latin American (LA) Spine Surgeons in the last decade.
Methods: A literature search of publications by LA spinal surgeons on topics concerning the spine or spinal cord was performed using an online database; Pubmed.gov. The results were limited to articles published from January 2000 to December 2011. The quality of the publication was evaluated with the journal impact factor (IF), Oxford classification and number of citations.
Results: This study comprised 320 articles published in the Medline database by LA spine surgeons from 2000 to 2011. In recent years, there has been an increase in the number of publications by LA spine surgeons. It was observed that 38.4% of LA papers were published in LA journals. 46.6% of the articles were published in journals with an IF lower than 1, and there was no statistically significant difference in the number of articles published in journals with a higher IF during the period. Linear-by-linear association analysis demonstrated an improvement in the level of evidence provided by LA articles published in recent years.
Conclusions: This study showed a growth in the number of publications in last 12 years by LA spinal surgeons. It is necessary to discuss a way to increase quantity and quality of scientific publications, mainly through a better education in research.