Lipsky PE " The lack of impact of the "impact factor" in clinical medicine, NATURE CLINICAL PRACTICE RHEUMATOLOGY 3 (4): 189-189 APR 2007

[David Goodman]

This article claims (on the basis of no data whatsoever) a lack of correlation of the usefulness of journals to 
clinicians with their impact factors.

the 6 highest ranking journals in general medicine, by impact factor are: 
1.New England Journal of Medicine
2.Lancet
3.JAMA
4.Annals of internal medicine
5.Annual review of medicine
6.British Medical Journal
Leaving aside Annual Review of Medicine, which has the well-understood  high impact factor characteristic of 
any review journal, which of these journals does the author propose as having a low impact of clinical 
practice? 

The author is the editor of Nature Clinical Practice Rheumatology, and 45% of their articles are  
classified by PubMed as review articles--as mentioned, the most obvious way of increasing impact factors as 
an artifact.    For this journal, the earliest articles are from 2005; using Scopus, which includes the journal, 
not a single item in the first issue has more than 2 citations; the mode is zero. 

The author claims prejudice because impact factors are prepared by a for-profit company; I think the 
evidence shows that Thomson has no prejudice against the equally for-profit NPG: the highest impact factor 
title in general science is from that publisher, as is the highest title in experimental medicine (Nature 
Medicine). 

David Goodman, Ph.D., M.L.S.
previously:
Bibliographer and Research Librarian
Princeton University Library

dgoodman at princeton.edu


----- Original Message -----
From: Eugene Garfield <garfield at CODEX.CIS.UPENN.EDU>
Date: Tuesday, May 1, 2007 4:07 pm
Subject: [SIGMETRICS] Lipsky PE " The lack of impact of the "impact factor" in clinical medicine, NATURE 
CLINICAL PRACTICE RHEUMATOLOGY 3 (4): 189-189 APR 2007
To: SIGMETRICS at LISTSERV.UTK.EDU

> Adminstrative info for SIGMETRICS (for example unsubscribe):
> http://web.utk.edu/~gwhitney/sigmetrics.html
> 
> The author, P.E. Lipsky, and the publisher, Nature Publishing 
> Group, have 
> kindly granted permission to post the full text of this editorial.
> 
> 
> P.E. Lipsky : lipskyp at mail.nih.gov
> 
> 
> Title: The lack of impact of the "impact factor' in clinical 
> medicine 
> 
> Author(s): Lipsky PE (Lipsky, Peter E.) 
> 
> Source: NATURE CLINICAL PRACTICE RHEUMATOLOGY 3 (4): 189-189 APR 
> 2007 
> 
> Document Type: Editorial Material 
> Language: English 
> Cited References: 0      Times Cited: 0      
> 
> Publisher: NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP, 75 VARICK STREET, 9TH FLOOR, 
> NEW YORK, 
> NY 10013-1917 USA 
> Subject Category: Rheumatology; Social Issues 
> IDS Number: 152KK 
> 
> ISSN: 1745-8382  
> 
>