Citation indexing and the development of academic journals in tropical medicine

Abstract

It has been suggested that the conquest of tropical diseases during the late XIX century represents one of modern medicines’ greatest triumphs (Brennen & Davey 1978). Much of the impetus for this achievement was spurred by the high prevalence of disease and epidemics that were at the time devastating new settlers, colonial servants or military occupiers within foreign colonial territories (Keiser & Utzinger 2005). The formal study of tropical medicine can trace its origins to the Indian Medical Service of the British Army, which was founded in 1764 (Brennen & Davey 1978). The Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine and the London School of Tropi-cal Medicine began in April and October, respectively, of 1899 (Wilkinson & Power 1998). With the arrival of pandemic plague to South America the Brazilian gov-ernment founded the Instituto Soroterapico no Rio de Ja-neiro in 1900, which was later renamed after its famous director, Oswaldo Cruz (Momen & Coura 2000). The Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene was established at a “Meeting of Medical Men and Others Interested in Tropical Medicine” held in 1907 and where Sir Patrick Manson was elected president (Greenwood 2007). In 1929 the London School occupied a new prem-ises and changed its name to the London School of Hy-giene and Tropical Medicine, with a goal to centralize the study of all aspects of public health (Schilling & Mc-Donald 1990). It also offered a range of qualifications in various fields including both occupational and tropical medicine (Smith 1981).For the most part, the early study of tropical medicine was dominated by parasitic and infectious diseases with an affinity for warm climates (Gilles & Lucas 1998), and associated academic journals in the field reflected this trend. The formation of academic societies in tropical medicine was also followed by the publication of aca-demic journals, the first English-language version being a short-lived publication known as the