Mike Taylor, University of Wolverhampton, UK; Digital Science. Jenny Ghith, Pfizer, USA Open Access medical research (2011-23): OA journal articles are associated with accelerated research and socio-clinical impact BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES • Open Access (OA) has been predicted to accelerate medical science (Woelfle et al., 2011) and expand the audience for research (UNESCO, 2022). • The annual cost of OA publication fees has been estimated to be $2B (Zhang et al., 2022). • Other researchers have identified potential issues with the growth of poor quality OA research (Beall, 2015). • Previous limited research (Holmberg 2019; Taylor, 2023) has reported some advantages for OA publications, however such research has not addressed the phenomena at scale, nor attempted to understand the consequences of the dominance of OA research. CONCLUSIONS • The growth of OA research and the associated impact indicators suggest that OA has increased the overall level of coverage and discussion linked to medical research, and that different forms of OA are not equivalent. • Traditional journals, whether supported with strong preprint (Green) policies or mixed Gold/Bronze OA publishing dominate all forms of impact. • The explosive growth of Gold OA journals is not delivering accelerated impact. • Rates of discourse in News and on X / Twitter have dropped since COVID, although Green maintains a strong advantage. • There is no evidence that the gap between OA and non-OA closes over time. Beall, J. (2015). What the Open-Access Movement Doesn’t Want You to Know. American Association of University Professors. https://www.aaup.org/article/what-open-access-movement-doesn%E2%80%99t-want-you-know Holmberg, K., Hedman, J., Bowman, T. D., Didegah, F., & Laakso, M. (2019). Do articles in open access journals have more frequent altmetric activity than articles in subscription-based journals? An investigation of the research output of Finnish universities. Scientometrics. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-019-03301-x Taylor, M. (2023). Slow, slow, quick, quick, slow: five altmetric sources observed over a decade show evolving trends, by research age, attention source maturity and open access status. Scientometrics. https://doi.org/10.1007/S11192-023-04653-1 UNESCO. (2022). Understanding open science. https://doi.org/10.54677/UTCD9302 Woelfle, M., Olliaro, P., & Todd, M. H. (2011). Open science is a research accelerator. Nature Chemistry 2011 3:10, 3(10), 745–748. https://doi.org/10.1038/nchem.1149 Zhang, L., Wei, Y., Huang, Y., & Sivertsen, G. (2022). Should open access lead to closed research? The trends towards paying to perform research. Scientometrics, 127(12), 7653–7679. https://doi.org/10.1007/S11192-022-04407-5/FIGURES/8 Gold in Open Journal Gold in Hybrid Journal Closed with Preprint (Green) Closed Bronze 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 0 100,000 200,000 300,000 400,000 500,000 600,000 700,000 Year of Publication # Publications Explosive growth in Gold in Open Journals over the decade Papers from 2023 still embargoed Increased in paid-for OA, decrease in preprint OA Growth in all forms of OA following federal / national funding policy changes Gold in Open Journal Gold in Hybrid Journal Closed with Preprint (Green) Closed Bronze 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 0.00 1.00 2.00 3.00 4.00 5.00 6.00 7.00 Year of Publication Annual Mean Citations per Year Citations are a lagging indicator, so lower rates expected in recent years, embargo still applies to 2023 publications Increased OA in traditional journals accelerated research during COVID Although in a minority, Green OA in Closed journals out-performs all other OA/non-OA publications Gold in Open Journal Gold in Hybrid Journal Closed with Preprint (Green) Closed Bronze 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 0.00 2.50 5.00 7.50 10.00 12.50 15.00 17.50 20.00 22.50 25.00 Year of Publication Mean Altmetric Attent