[Proportion of reports published after their presentation in meetings of Farmacia Hospitalaria].

Objective: The goal of our study is to establish the publishing percentage of reports accepted in congresses of Sociedad Española de Farmacia Hospitalaria held during the years 1996-98.

Methods: Any paper in a journal indexed within Indice Médico Español.

Results: From a total of 638 reports, 35 corresponding to the 1998 congress (15.6%), 27 to the 1997 congress (13.4%) and 30 to the 1996 congress (15.6%) were later published. Only 3.4% of the aforementioned 638 reports were published in journals indexed in Index Medicus.

Conclusions: Percentages found were noticeably lower than those of other medical groups (41%), but higher than those found for the American Society of Health Pharmacists Congress, held in 1994 (11%). Published reports only rarely show up in journals indexed in Index Medicus. Such scarce widespreading of studies takes relevant information away from both the scientific and clinical communities, and introduces publication biases for systematic reviews. The recent inclusion of our journal "Farmacia Hospitalaria" in Medline will notably increase paper spreading.