Publishing characteristics of chairpersons of physical medicine and rehabilitation departments.

Abstract

Previous studies note that specific factors intrinsic to an academic department of physical medicine and rehabilitation influence the academic productivity of individual faculty members. To determine whether one of these factors is related to the productivity of departmental chairpersons, this issue was studied for the period from 1983 to 1993. The productivity of chairpersons serving 4 or more consecutive years in the same department significantly declined. Moreover, the productivity of long-term chairpersons (greater than 10 years) was significantly below that of the group of high-frequency publishing chairpersons. Departments with long-term chairpersons also had fewer publications than departments with high-frequency publishing chairpersons. The academic productivity of the chairperson is a factor likely to influence the productivity of the department.