More than Two Decades of Dissertation Writing in the Faculty of Surgery, National Postgraduate Medical College of Nigeria: How Many of These Dissertations Get Published in Peer-Reviewed Journals

Abstract Introduction: A dissertation is a document of scientific relevance, however, the concept of dissertation writing as a component of postgraduate surgical training has been the mainstay of many residency training programmes across the World but most importantly is its pivotal role in the qualification of surgical trainees for the award of fellowship. Nevertheless, if it is not published in a scientific journal, its visibility will be restricted and its objective will be defeated. Notwithstanding, the publishing rate in journals is low amongst dissertations, therefore we seek to investigate the publishing rates of surgery dissertations in journals and the conversion rates. Materials and Methods: This is a retrospective study of dissertations submitted to the National Postgraduate Medical College of Nigeria (NPMCN) between May 2012 and November 2022 which were retrieved from the college’s website and entered into an Excel sheet. The author checked whether the dissertations were published in a journal or not, by searching the dissertation in PubMed, AJOL, Google Scholar and Scopus with the names of their authors. Those specialities that are no more under the Faculty of Surgery and incomplete data were excluded from the study. Results: A total of 146 dissertations were received in the faculty of Surgery of the NPMCN, however, only 142 met the inclusion criteria for the study and were thus analysed. General Surgery and urology sub-specialties constituted 35.2% (50 of 142) and 26.1% (37 of 142), respectively, accounting for the specialty with the most submitted dissertations. The conversion rate of dissertations presented to the Faculty of Surgery of the NPMCN by November 2022 was 44.4% (63 of 142). The median time to publication of the dissertation in any peer-reviewed Journal was 29.00 months (range: 1–100 months). Amongst the articles published in peer-reviewed Journals, only 20.4% (29 of 142) were in PubMed/AJOL/Scopus-indexed Journals. The writer of the dissertation was the first author of 55 (91.6%) articles. Most of the dissertations were published in the first three years following submission to the college (55.5% or 35 of 63). Conclusion: The rate of publication of dissertations in Surgery is low, with only 44.4% being published in peer-reviewed journals. From our study, the duration between submission to the college and publication in a peer-reviewed journal was long, therefore conversion of the dissertation to publication in a peer reviewed journal should be a deliberate one and not viewed as a burden with incentives from training institutions and employers to the authors.