An analysis of national collaboration with spanish researchers abroad in the health sciences

Abstract

Background: The establishment of scientific collaborations with researchers abroad can be considered a goodpractice to make appropriate use of their knowledge and to increase the possibilities of them returning to theircountry. This paper analyses the collaboration between Spanish researchers abroad devoted to health sciences andnational science institutions.Methods: We used the Fontes' approach to perform a study on this collaboration with Spanish researchers abroad.We measured the level of national and international cooperation, the opportunity provided by the host country tocollaborate, the promotion of collaboration by national science institutions, and the types of collaboration. A totalof 88 biomedical researchers out of the 268 Spanish scientists who filled up the survey participated in the study.Different data analyses were performed to study the variables selected to measure the scientific collaboration andprofile of Spanish researchers abroad.Results: There is a high level of cooperation between Spanish health science researchers abroad and internationalinstitutions, which contrasts with the small-scale collaboration with national institutions. Host countries facilitate thiscollaboration with national and international scientific institutions to a larger extent than the level of collaborationpromotion carried out by Spanish institutions.Conclusions: The national collaboration with Spanish researchers abroad in the health sciences is limited. Thus, thepractice of making appropriate use of the potential of their expertise should be promoted and the opportunities forSpanish health science researchers to return home should be improved.