OBJETIVO:Avaliar a tendência do número de publicações oriundos dos programas de pós-graduação brasileiros em saúde da criança e do adolescente e a proporção de citações desses artigos no MEDLINE e no Journal Citation Reports (JCR), utilizando a primeira base de dados como medida de eficiência e a última como indicador de visibilidade. MÉTODOS: Avaliamos 14 programas de pós-graduação quanto ao número de teses, dissertações e artigos citados no MEDLINE e JCR, através de dados secundários das duas últimas avaliações trienais realizadas pela Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES), de 1998 até 2000 e de 2001 até 2003. RESULTADOS:O número de artigos publicados aumentou (de 1.520 para 1.917), bem como o número mediano de artigos citados tanto no MEDLINE (de 32,5 para 45) como no JCR (de 24,5 para 27). O número mediano de dissertações aumentou de 19,5 para 26,5; o número mediano de teses cresceu de 12 para 13,5. O número mediano de orientadores diminuiu (de 21,5 para 18,4). CONCLUSÃO: Os programas de pós-graduação em saúde infantil e do adolescente tornaram-se mais eficientes quanto à produção de conhecimento através da publicação de mais artigos com maior visibilidade internacional. Tal tendência foi acompanhada contraditoriamente pela redução no número de orientadores.

OBJECTIVE:To assess the trend in the number of published articles by Brazilian graduate programs in child and adolescent health and the proportion of such publications cited in MEDLINE and Thomson Scientific's Journal Citation Reports (JCR), using the former database as a proxy for efficiency and the latter as an indicator of visibility. METHODS: We assessed the trends of 14 graduate programs concerning the number of theses, dissertations, and articles cited in MEDLINE and JCR, through secondary data from the latest two triennial evaluations carried out by the Brazilian Federal Agency for the Improvement of Higher Education (Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior, CAPES) between 1998 and 2000 and between 2001 and 2003). RESULTS:The number of published articles increased (1,520 to 1,917), as did the median number of articles cited both in MEDLINE (32.5 to 45) and in JCR (24.5 to 27). The median number of dissertations rose from 19.5 to 26.5; the median number of theses went up from 12 to 13.5. The median number of faculty advisors decreased (21.5 to 18.4). CONCLUSION: Graduate programs in child and adolescent health became more efficient in producing knowledge through the publication of more articles with broader international visibility. Such trend was contradictorily accompanied by a diminishing number of advisors.

Brazilian scientific output exhibited a 4-fold increase in the last two decades because of the stability of the investment in research and development activities and of changes in the policies of the main funding agencies. Most of this production is concentrated in public universities and research institutes located in the richest part of the country. Among all areas of knowledge, the most productive are Health and Biological Sciences. During the 1998-2002 period these areas presented heterogeneous growth ranging from 4.5% (Pharmacology) to 191% (Psychiatry), with a median growth rate of 47.2%. In order to identify and rank the 20 most prolific institutions in these areas, searches were made in three databases (DataCAPES, ISI and MEDLINE) which permitted the identification of 109,507 original articles produced by the 592 Graduate Programs in Health and Biological Sciences offered by 118 public universities and research institutes. The 20 most productive centers, ranked according to the total number of ISI-indexed articles published during the 1998-2003 period, produced 78.7% of the papers in these areas and are strongly concentrated in the Southern part of the country, mainly in São Paulo State.

The objective of the present survey was to assess the Brazilian scientific production in psychiatry, psychobiology, and mental health during the 1998-2002 period. The universities' graduate programs concentrate the vast majority of the scientific production in Brazil. We assessed the annual reports from the graduate programs to the Brazilian Ministry of Education concerning master's and doctoral theses and the articles published in journals indexed by the Institute of Scientific Information (ISI). There are nine Master's and Doctoral graduate programs dedicated to research in psychiatry, neuropsychiatry, psychobiology, and mental health in the country, seven being located in southern states. During the 5-year period, from 1998 to 2002, 186 students received their doctorate degree (37/year). The programs published 637 articles in journals indexed by ISI, the majority of them in journals with an impact factor higher than 2. The research advisors' productivity varied among graduate programs, ranging from 0.6 to 2.0 articles per year in ISI-indexed journals. Despite the substantial barriers faced by the Brazilian scientific community (mainly financial and writing difficulties), Brazil's scientific mental health production is on the rise. The number of articles published in ISI-indexed journals has doubled without a significant increase in the number of graduate theses, suggesting that there was an improvement in both the quality of the scientific production and the productivity of the graduate programs. Based on these data, it is reasonable to predict a tendency to an increase in production over the next few years.