PubMed Citation Totals by Publication Year Since 1781

PubMed provides yearly citation totals from the MEDLINE/PubMed Baseline, with records dating back to 1781. The dataset tracks how citation counts for a given year increase as new records are added to the baseline. For instance, citations for the year 1800 grew from 25 in the 2018 baseline to 387 in the 2019 baseline.

Use Cases

• Analyze the growth rate of historical biomedical literature indexed by PubMed over publication year.
• Model the temporal distribution of scientific publications using yearly citation totals.
• Track the expansion of the MEDLINE/PubMed Baseline by comparing citation totals for specific years across different baseline releases.

Strengths

• Covers a long historical time range, with data extending back to the year 1781.
• Data is updated with new baseline releases, as shown by the increase from 25 to 387 citations for the year 1800.
• Provided by the authoritative U.S. Department of Health & Human Services.

Limitations

• The exact number of rows (years) and specific column structure are not provided in the input.
• Totals for a given year are not static and can increase with each new baseline, which may complicate longitudinal analysis without versioning.
• The raw description does not specify the frequency or schedule of baseline updates.

Provenance

Source

U.S. Department of Health & Human Services

Collection Method

Derived from the MEDLINE/PubMed Baseline, which aggregates citations.

Time Range

Publication years from 1781 onward.

Freshness

Last updated on 2025-06-19.