The Impact Factor of <i>Dermatology</i>

A journal has recently published a paper on the impact factor of dermatology journals [1]. Data concerning Dermatology are flawed: We are credited (table 2) to have published (only) 459 papers from 1981 to 1993, when the exact figure is 1,954. The number of ‘source items’ that is apparently the number of articles considered by Dubin and Arndt worth including in their calculation for Dermatology is curiously the same (148) for the two years 1991 and 1992 (table 1) and then for another period of time, 1981 and 1992 (table 3). The number of citations of papers published in Dermatology from 1981 to 1993, i.e. 12 years, is said to be 217 (table 2) when it was 1,343 only for the year 1990 [2]. Such flaws obviously make inadequate calculations reported in this article about our journal. I hope that no similar errors have been made for other journals. The one that I found is that the American Journal of Dermatopathology has apparently been misquoted as American Journal of Dermatology’. Perhaps calculations on the impact factors should be left to professionals (e.g. Journal Citation Reports); alternatively, any paper dealing with the subject should be submitted to accurate peer review. Our readers and contributors may be interested to know the latest official data provided for Dermatology from 1983 to 1994 by the Journal Citation Reports (fig. 1). Fueling the current fashion for all kinds of impact factors [3] (that remind us of the commercially oriented ‘audience factor’ for TV networks) calls for, at least, accurate data for the addicts. J.-H. Saurat 1.2