title: Publication productivity in nuclear medicine.
abstract: Publications form the knowledge base of any profession. Patterns in professional publications provide insight into the profession's maturity and global status. To our knowledge, publication productivity in nuclear medicine technology has not been reported. A recent study on publication productivity in radiography and radiation therapy provided interesting insight; however, a sampling bias resulted in study flaws.
  
  
  METHODS
  The most productive medical radiation technologists were determined by collecting data from 7 key, international peer-reviewed journals for the medical radiation sciences over a 5-y period. A full list of the technologists' publications, for the 5-y period, was obtained using a PubMed and ResearchGate search, and the authors were analyzed.
  
  
  RESULTS
  In total, 165 medical radiation technologists were identified who had published 3 or more articles between 2009 and 2013. Of these authors, 55.2% (91/165) were radiographers, 35.2% (58/165) were radiation therapists, and 9.6% (16/165) were nuclear medicine technologists. Overall, the majority of the most prolific authors were academics (104/165; 63.0%). After we applied a correction factor (the productivity per member of the registered workforce), radiography had the fewest authors publishing, compared with the relative workflow sizes.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Nuclear medicine technologists demonstrated a high degree of productivity both absolutely and relatively. Consequently, nuclear medicine technologists have a productive research culture and command a large footprint within and outside the key medical radiation science journals.
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Science, Charles Sturt University, Wagga Wagga, New South Wales, Australia; and.
authors.forename: Cheryl
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: McKellar
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Science, Charles Sturt University, Wagga Wagga, New South Wales, Australia; and Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Macquarie University, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
authors.forename: Geoff
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Currie
mesh_terms: D038622:Internationality; D009683:Nuclear Medicine / Q000458:organization & administration; D011642:Publications / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*
keywords: medical radiation science; patterns, nuclear medicine; productivity; publication