Is research related to a country's economic development? An analysis of biomedical publications from several GCC and ASEAN countries from 1994-2013

INTRODUCTION: Biomedical research has traditionally been the domain of developed countries. We aim to study the effects of the increased focus on biomedical and medical research on level 1-4 publications in several industrialised and newly industrialised countries endowed with petroleum and gas resources.

METHODS: We identified all level 1-4 publications from 01/01/1994 to 31/12/2013 via PubMed using advanced options. The population and GDP (current US$) data from 1994-2013 were obtained through data provided by the World Bank and the raw data was normalised based on these two indicators.

RESULTS: From 1994-2013, Saudi Arabia and Malaysia were responsible for the highest absolute number of level 1 to 4 biomedical and medical research publications with 2551 and 1951 publications respectively. When normalised to population, Kuwait and Qatar had the highest publication rates, with 7.84 and 3.99 publications per 100,000 inhabitants respectively in a five yearly average. Kuwait produced the largest number of publications per billion (current US$) of GDP, at 2.92 publications, followed by Malaysia at 2.82 publications in a five yearly average.

CONCLUSION: The population size of a country as well as GDP can influence the number of level 1-4 publications in some countries. More importantly, effective government policy which stimulates research as well as a culture which actively promotes research as shown by Malaysia have proven to have a larger influence on the amount of level 1-4 biomedical and medical publications.