What happens to the abstracts presented at the Societe Internationale d'Urologie meeting?

OBJECTIVES To estimate the acceptance rate on peer-reviewed journals, describe the time-course of subsequent full publication, and identify those with characteristics associated with publication from the abstracts presented at the Societe Internationale d'Urologie (SIU) meeting. METHODS All abstracts accepted for presentation at the annual 2002 and 2004 SIU meetings were identified from the published supplements in the BJU International. The subsequent publication rate for the corresponding studies by scanning Medline was evaluated. RESULTS Overall, 1877 abstracts were presented, 415 of which (22.1%) were followed by publication in peer-reviewed journals. The mean time to publication was 13 months (range, I to 45 months). A total of 60.6% of the published articles were in print within I year of presentation "In most of the cases the reports were published in The Journal of Urology (76 reports) and in Urology (49 reports). Abstracts on kidney cancer, urinary diversion, incontinence, and urolithiasis had the highest publication rates (43.4%, 36.6%, 33.3%, and 29.2%, respectively). Studies from North America and from Oceania had the highest publication rate (26.8% and 26.6%, respectively). CONCLUSIONS One fifth of the abstracts presented at the SIU meetings are ultimately published in indexed journals. Delegates attending these meetings should be aware of this issue when taking into account findings from meeting reports for their clinical practice. Factors influencing their publication are the abstract geographical area of origin, the study subject, and the research type. The Journal of Urology and Urology represented target journals for the publication more than other ones.