Abstract to publication rate: Do all the papers presented in conferences see the light of being a full publication?

BACKGROUND: Every year the scientific sessions of Annual National Conference of Indian Psychiatric Society (ANCIPS) are marked by presentation of free papers, posters, and award paper sessions, which are usually meant for presentation of new research which is not yet published. Hence, it is expected that these papers will be published in near future so that the scientific literature is distributed and shared with wider audience. AIM: This paper aims to evaluate the abstract to publication rate of papers presented during ANCIPS in the years 2012–2014. MATERIALS AND METHODS: For this study, all the free papers, posters, and award papers presented during the ANCIPS of 2012–2014 were listed, and electronic searches were carried out to search for published articles. In addition, one of the authors of papers not found in the electronic searches were contacted through E-mail. RESULTS: A total of 1081 papers were presented during the ANCIPS in the 3 year period under study. Of these, 64 were award papers, 622 were free papers, and 395 were posters. Majority (n = 807; 74.6%) of these could be categorized as research data-based presentations; this was followed by case reports/series (203; 18.8%), review of literature (n = 35; 3.3%), and others (n = 36; 3.3%). Overall, only 27% of the papers were published after at least 5 years of the presentation. Of all the award papers, 69.6% of papers were published, whereas only 26.8% of free oral papers and 22.5% of free posters were published. About half (45.6%) of the papers were published in national journals. In terms of indexing, among those which were published, 62.8% were published in Medline-indexed (PubMed-listed) Journals with a mean impact factor of 1. CONCLUSION: The present study shows that only 27% of the abstracts presented during the ANCIPS are ultimately published as full text articles in the next 5 years.