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Research Published in 2003 by U.S. Family Medicine Authors

Department of Family Medicine (DEP, AJV, WPN), University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research (DEP), University of North Carolina at Chapel Hillgrap

Correspondence: Corresponding author: Donald Pathman, Department of Family Medicine, University of North Carolina School of Medicine, CB 7595, Chapel Hill, NC, 27599-7595 (E-mail: don_pathman{at}unc.edu)

Objectives: The discipline of family medicine seeks to build its research enterprise. To assess the state of family medicine research in the United States, this study identifies and describes research articles published by family medicine researchers from the United States in 2003 and assesses the growth in articles, authors, and publishing journals since 2000.

Methods: We searched for all research articles published in 2003 in scholarly, English-language journals authored by individuals in US family medicine organizations and by family physicians from the United States. Search approaches included a hard copy review of 22 journals and Medline searches of articles by family medicine authors and organizations. Similar search approaches, previously reported, were used to identify articles published in 2000.

Results: For 2003 we found 790 research articles dispersed across 285 journals from 801 family medicine researcher-authors. Twenty-nine journals published 6 or more family medicine research articles; 159 journals published just 1 research article from the discipline. Family medicine journals published 18% of the discipline's research articles. People in academic departments authored the vast majority (89%) of the discipline's research. Between 2000 and 2003 family medicine's research articles increased by an estimated 58%, its authors increased by 41%, and journals used increased by 82%.

Conclusions: Family medicine's research enterprise in the United States is larger and more productive than generally recognized, and it is growing. Nevertheless, family medicine likely publishes fewer research articles than some other clinical disciplines.

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