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Impact of publications about medicinal plants reported in scopus

Abstract:

Introduction: In the particular case of scientific production about medicinal plants, although literature reviews have been conducted in the past years about a variety of topics, no systematic study has been reported about publications and their impact in terms of their use by other authors and journals. Objective: Analyze the impact indicator for documents reported in Scopus on the topic of medicinal plants based on the number of citations in later publications. The analysis took into account aspects that researchers from the field should consider to enhance the impact of their contributions. Methods: A search was conducted in Scopus for documents which included the term "medicinal plants" in their title. A total 223 documents were found which had been published from 1946 to 2017. It was found that these documents had been cited in another 580. Determination was made of the impact of publications, the most relevant countries and journals, the most cited authors, and the key words for both groups. Results: It was concluded that after a period of development until the year 2000, a greater influence may be observed of studies about medicinal plants on the scientific community. As evidenced in the study, this influence is determined by a concentration of production in selected authors, journals and countries. Analysis of key words revealed greater dispersion in the papers about medicinal plants reported in Scopus than in the documents citing them. Conclusions: The results obtained show how important it is for authors to be aware that a scientific community has been established in Hispanic America whose production influences the international scientific community. Authors should therefore not only review the most important sources on the topic of medicinal plants, but also consider the characteristics of the highest impact journals influenced by those sources.