Summary: | Objective: To conduct a critical analysis of the two main bibliometric indexes used by science: the impact factor and the H index. Method: Research was conducted on PubMed using the keywords: impact factor, Bibliometrics and H index. Results: The citations of articles tend to follow a curve in which the articles published in a given year increase sharply to a peak occurring between two and six years after its publication. From this peak citations decline over time. Conclusion: The analysis of the scientific merit should not be based on only in bibliometric measure, but in the association of various parameters. The impact factor and the H index is mainly based on the number of citations of scientific papers, and this parameter, although important, should not be used alone, nor overvalued in the evaluation of teaching merit.
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