A study carried out tried to establish a relationship between the process of preparingand editing scientific articles and the process of training and improvement or growth of the professional as a researcher. The analysis of texts was used as a fundamental method of the research as a variant of the method of analysis of the results of the activity in all the originals delivered to the magazine Transformation between 2013 and the first semester of 2015. The characterization of the work of each researcher was compared with a sample from the rest of their scientific production. The results include the characterization of the informational and the investigative in the researcher training process, the challenges that the preparation of articles imposes on the researcher in training and the editorial contribution to this process. The authors used the following keywords: scientific writing, editing, researcher training and researcher development.
The objective of the study was to quantify student participation in the publication of original articles in Peruvian medical journals indexed to SciELO Peru. The design was a retrospective observational study, using the Hemeroteca of the Faculty of Medicine UNMSM and in www.scielo.org.pe. The authors used as population original articles, short communications (including clinical cases) and letters to the editor published in volumes corresponding to 1997 to 2005, in updated quarterly journals. Interventions: Review of the affiliation of the authors (student or professional; gender, university and career of origin), type of article and research area (clinical, biomedical and public health).
Respect to the frequency and percentage of articles with student participation, the study found 865 original contributions from four journals; in four, 5% of them had student participation in authorship, 74% were original articles, 10 short communications and no letter to the editor. Medicine was the journal that published the most student articles (6.6%). The median was five student articles per year. Ten articles were written only by students, 87% came from three universities (Universidad National Mayor de San Marcos, Universidad Paraná Gaetano Heredia and Universidad Private A tenor Oregon) and 58%, from the clinical area. The majority (72%) of the authors were male. They authors concluded that student participation in the publication of articles in Peruvian medical journals indexed in Peru is low. The recommendation was to train students in the publication of their research. A way to do this and that has become available online is to provide access to scientific writing courses.
The authors also found that Latin American scientific production, evaluated through articles published in mainstream journals (Current Context / ISI), represents less than 1% worldwide; Peru contributes 0.95% of Latin American articles and, of these, 78% is carried out with the participation of foreign authors. In the area of public health, Peru’s participation in the material included in LILACS is somewhat higher (3.9%), but it is still low compared to Brazil, Argentina, Mexico and Chile.
This low productivity as a country occurs despite the existence of 29 medical schools, which according to current Peruvian university legislation have research as a mandatory function of their teachers. However, only two schools have scientific journals that are published regularly and are indexed in SciELO-Peru.
Research during undergraduate studies has been recognized as an important factor to continue researching in professional life, an aspect that has been described by researchers from the UNMSM Faculty of Medicine; since 41% of them state that they have investigated in the student period or have been apprentices of researchers with more experience.
These serious situations lead the authors of the study to reflect on its possible causes and solutions; part of the problem and response is found in the training of new researchers. This training can be facilitated externally through affiliate programs and courses in this area. In conclusion, it seems medical schools must take into account research as the axis of medical training and instrument for institutional development and accept as a mandatory task for teachers to research and publish their knowledge.
