[The evaluation of Mexican biomedical journals: a description of the 2005 process for the Artemisa index].
BACKGROUND
The production of scientific health publications is ever increasing and it is therefore essential to evaluate their quality as well as their repercussion and visibility in the scientific community, so that they can be included and indexed in the various national and international databases. The Information Center for Public Health Decisions (CENIDSP) at the National Public Health Institute (INSP) has produced since 1992 a CD ROM under the name Artemisa (articles on health information published in Mexico). In 2005 it included the full version of 56 journals which were rigorously evaluated and met the selection and evaluation criteria for inclusion.


OBJECTIVE
Describe the selection criteria and the evaluation process followed in 2005 to choose the biomedical journals included in Artemisa.


METHODS
It consists of a description of the universe of journals to be included according to the guidelines established and of the first stage of the evaluation (journal and article format). Based on the results, journals were selected for the second stage, which consisted of evaluating the content of the articles randomly selected.


RESULTS
Twenty-one journals were included in the first stage, 19 of which were selected for the second stage. A total of 274 articles were selected for peer review by the Mexican Health Journals Evaluation System (SERM@S), with the participation of 64 evaluators. The final result of the second stage was satisfactory to all of them.


CONCLUSIONS
The evaluation of biomedical journals conducted by CENIDSP has led to maintaining a quality standard of the biomedical publications in Mexico.
Araujo-Pulido
Guadalupe Teresa
GT
Centro de Información para Decisiones en Salud Pública, Instituto Nacional de Salud Pública, 7' Cda. de Fray Pedro de Gante Núm. 50, Col. Sección XVI, Tlalpan, C.P. 14000 México. taraujo@correo.insp.mx
Vieyra-Avila
José Armando
JA
Meza-Barrera
María de los Angeles
Mde L
D000047:Academies and Institutes; D017408:Guidelines as Topic; D006801:Humans; D008800:Mexico; D010380:Peer Review; D010506:Periodicals as Topic / Q000592:standards*