bims-evares Biomed News
on Evaluation of research
Issue of 2019–12–15
twenty-six papers selected by
Thomas Krichel, Open Library Society



  1. J Am Acad Dermatol. 2019 Dec 10. pii: S0190-9622(19)33241-4. [Epub ahead of print]
      
    Keywords:  Altmetric Attention Score; PlumX Metrics; Web-based presence; citation impact; dermatology journalism; online impact; social media
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaad.2019.12.003
  2. Clin Implant Dent Relat Res. 2019 Dec 12.
       BACKGROUND: The influence of research has long been studied using citations and impact factors (IFs). Electronic media is changing how people interact with the scientific literature. There are few investigations into these trends.
    PURPOSE: To explore whether Altmetrics correlate with traditional bibliometrics in the Implantology literature.
    MATERIALS AND METHODS: Five Implantology journals with the highest IF and the 10 most highly-cited articles within those journals from 2013 to 2016 were reviewed. Altmetric score, citation count, and media "mentions" were recorded. Comparisons were conducted between Altmetric score, citations, and IF by performing Pearson correlation coefficients and descriptive statistics. Twitter accounts were studied and compared to other metrics.
    RESULTS: Analysis revealed no correlation between citations and Altmetrics (r = .096,P = .506) or IF and Altmetrics (r = .111,P = .443) in 2013. Altmetrics were also not significantly correlated with citations (r = 0.148,P = .305) or IF (r = .145,P = .315) in 2016. Total Altmetric scores were nine times higher in 2016 compared to 2013, with news outlets and Twitter seeing large increases in mentions. Twitter was the top medium receiving mentions across the two cohorts.
    CONCLUSIONS: Compared to other fields, Implantology articles received lower Altmetric scores, noting an area of improvement. Altmetrics at this time are insufficient to replace traditional bibliometrics, but may provide helpful real-time information concerning article dissemination.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/cid.12876
  3. Bioinformatics. 2019 Dec 12. pii: btz923. [Epub ahead of print]
       MOTIVATION: Name ambiguity has long been a central problem in biomedical text mining. To tackle it, it has been usually assumed that names present only one meaning within a given text. It is not known whether this assumption applies beyond the scope of single documents.
    RESULTS: Using a new method that leverages large numbers of biomedical annotations and normalized citations, this study shows that ambiguous biomedical names mentioned in scientific articles tend to present the same meaning in articles that cite them or that they cite, and, to a lesser extent, two steps away in the citation network. Citations, therefore, can be regarded as semantic connections between articles and the citation network should be considered for tasks such as automatic name disambiguation, entity linking and biomedical database annotation. A simple experiment shows the applicability of these findings to name disambiguation.
    AVAILABILITY: The code used for this analysis is available at: https://github.com/raroes/one-sense-per-citation-network.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1093/bioinformatics/btz923
  4. F1000Res. 2019 ;8 1353
      Background: Evaluation of the quality of research software is a challenging and relevant issue, still not sufficiently addressed by the scientific community. Methods: Our contribution begins by defining, precisely but widely enough, the notions of research software and of its authors followed by a study of the evaluation issues, as the basis for the proposition of a sound assessment protocol: the CDUR procedure. Results: CDUR comprises four steps introduced as follows: Citation, to deal with correct RS identification, Dissemination, to measure good dissemination practices, Use, devoted to the evaluation of usability aspects, and Research, to assess the impact of the scientific work. Conclusions: Some conclusions and recommendations are finally included. The evaluation of research is the keystone to boost the evolution of the Open Science policies and practices.  It is as well our belief that research software evaluation is a fundamental step to induce better research software practices and, thus, a step towards more efficient science.
    Keywords:  Open Science; Research Software; Research Software Citation; Research Software Evaluation; Research evaluation; Scientific Software
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.19994.1
  5. Nature. 2019 Dec;576(7786): 213
      
    Keywords:  Publishing; Research data
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-019-03808-6
  6. J Vasc Surg. 2019 Dec 09. pii: S0741-5214(19)32497-8. [Epub ahead of print]
       OBJECTIVE: A diverse array of measures are used to evaluate academic physicians. One critical factor is the scholarly influence an author has on the research discourse within a field. The National Institutes of Health recently developed the Relative Citation Ratio (RCR) as a method to quantify the influence of published research. The aim of this study was to examine the academic influence of vascular surgeons using RCR within common vascular disease research fields.
    METHODS: Using the PubMed and National Institutes of Health iCite databases, scientific fields of abdominal and thoracic aortic aneurysm, peripheral artery disease (PAD), cerebral vascular occlusive disease, deep venous thrombosis (DVT), and venous insufficiency were queried for the highest rated RCR articles in each category (2007-2012). To calculate the RCR, article citation rates are divided by an expected citation rate derived from performance of articles in the same field, with the resulting RCR being level and field independent. Article categories were divided into basic science, health services, and clinical research on the basis of two independent reviews. For articles, academic backgrounds of the first, second, and last authors ("influential authors") were collected analyzing procedural specialty: surgery, medicine subspecialty (cardiology, neurology, nephrology), radiology/engineering, and other (anesthesia and pediatrics). Statistical significance between scientific fields and academic background was determined using Student t-test or analysis of variance followed by Newman-Keuls post hoc test.
    RESULTS: The academic influence of vascular surgeons varied substantially by the scientific field. Vascular surgeons compared with medical specialists were found to have the highest academic influence in abdominal aortic aneurysm research, composing 51% of the influential authors on the highest rated RCR studies (5.9 ± 0.8 vs 5.6 ± 0.8; P = .6). In contrast, vascular surgeons composed only 13% of influential authors compared with medical specialists in DVT (RCR, 2.6 ± 0.3 vs 15.7 ± 1.7; P < .003) and 18% in PAD (RCR, 1.9 ± 0.5 vs 2.1 ± 0.2; P = .78) research fields. Grouping all vascular fields of study together, no difference in RCR was found between vascular surgery and radiology/engineering. However, the mean RCR was significantly lower for vascular surgeons compared with medical subspecialties (4.5 ± 0.4 vs 6.8 ± 0.5; P < .05).
    CONCLUSIONS: Vascular surgeons exhibit a moderate academic influence in the field of aneurysmal disease but lag behind medical subspecialists in high-impact scientific contributions to the fields of PAD and DVT. Innovative strategies and collaborations are likely needed to increase the influence of vascular surgeons on the academic discourse of several vascular disease research fields.
    Keywords:  Academic productivity; Education; Vascular surgery; iCite
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvs.2019.09.036
  7. J Neurosurg. 2019 Dec 06. pii: 2019.9.JNS192346. [Epub ahead of print] 1-9
       OBJECTIVE: Previous authors have investigated many factors that predict an academic neurosurgical career over private practice, including attainment of a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) and number of publications. Research has yet to demonstrate whether a master's degree predicts an academic neurosurgical career. This study quantifies the association between obtaining a Master of Science (MS), Master of Public Health (MPH), or Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree and pursuing a career in academic neurosurgery.
    METHODS: Public data on neurosurgeons who had graduated from Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME)-accredited residency programs in the period from 1949 to 2019 were collected from residency and professional websites. Residency graduates with a PhD were excluded to isolate the effect of only having a master's degree. A position was considered "academic" if it was affiliated with a hospital that had a neurosurgery residency program; other positions were considered nonacademic. Bivariate analyses were performed with Fisher's exact test. Multivariate analysis was performed using a logistic regression model.
    RESULTS: Within our database of neurosurgery residency alumni, there were 47 (4.1%) who held an MS degree, 31 (2.7%) who held an MPH, and 10 (0.9%) who held an MBA. In bivariate analyses, neurosurgeons with MS degrees were significantly more likely to pursue academic careers (OR 2.65, p = 0.0014, 95% CI 1.40-5.20), whereas neurosurgeons with an MPH (OR 1.41, p = 0.36, 95% CI 0.64-3.08) or an MBA (OR 1.00, p = 1.00, 95% CI 0.21-4.26) were not. In the multivariate analysis, an MS degree was independently associated with an academic career (OR 2.48, p = 0.0079, 95% CI 1.28-4.93). Moreover, postresidency h indices of 1 (OR 1.44, p = 0.048, 95% CI 1.00-2.07), 2-3 (OR 2.76, p = 2.01 × 10-8, 95% CI 1.94-3.94), and ≥ 4 (OR 4.88, p < 2.00 × 10-16, 95% CI 3.43-6.99) were all significantly associated with increased odds of pursuing an academic career. Notably, having between 1 and 11 months of protected research time was significantly associated with decreased odds of pursuing academic neurosurgery (OR 0.46, p = 0.049, 95% CI 0.21-0.98).
    CONCLUSIONS: Neurosurgery residency graduates with MS degrees are more likely to pursue academic neurosurgical careers relative to their non-MS counterparts. Such findings may be used to help predict residency graduates' future potential in academic neurosurgery.
    Keywords:  ACGME = Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education; DO = Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine; MBA = Master of Business Administration; MD = Doctor of Medicine; MPH = Master of Public Health; MS = Master of Science; PhD = Doctor of Philosophy; academic career; master’s degree; neurosurgery; residency
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.3171/2019.9.JNS192346
  8. J Med Syst. 2019 Dec 10. 44(1): 22
      StudyPortal was implemented as the first multilingual search platform for geographic visualization of clinical trials and scientific articles. The platform queries information from ClinicalTrials.gov, PubMed, a geodatabase and geographic maps to enable geospatial study search and real-time rendering of study locations or research networks on a map. Thus, disease-specific clinical studies or whole research networks can be shown in a geographic proximity. Moreover, a semantic layer enables multilingual disease input and autosuggestion of medical terms based on the Unified Medical Language System. The portal is accessible on https://studyportal.uni-muenster.de. This paper presents details on implementation of the novel search platform, its search evaluation and future work.
    Keywords:  Clinical trials; Geographic information systems; MEDLINE; Registries; UMLS
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s10916-019-1493-0
  9. JAMA Netw Open. 2019 Dec 02. 2(12): e1917530
       Importance: There is growing consensus that reliance on P values, particularly a cutoff level of .05 for statistical significance, is a factor in the challenges in scientific reproducibility. Despite this consensus, publications describing clinical trial results with P values near .05 anecdotally use declarative statements that do not express uncertainty.
    Objectives: To quantify uncertainty expression in abstracts describing the results of cancer randomized clinical trials (RCTs) with P values between .01 and .10 and examine whether trial features are associated with uncertainty expression.
    Data Sources: A total of 5777 prospective trials indexed on HemOnc.org, as of September 15, 2019.
    Study Selection: Two-arm RCTs with a superiority end point with P values between .01 and .10.
    Data Extraction and Synthesis: Abstracts were evaluated based on an uncertainty expression algorithm. Ordinal logistic regression modeling with multiple imputation was performed to identify whether characteristics of study design, results, trial authors, and context P values were normalized by dividing by prespecified α value.
    Main Outcomes and Measures: Uncertainty expression in abstracts as determined by the algorithm and its association with trial and publication characteristics.
    Results: Of 5777 trials screened, 556 met analysis criteria. Of these, 222 trials (39.9%) did not express uncertainty, 161 trials (29.0%) expressed some uncertainty, and 173 trials (31.1%) expressed full uncertainty. In ordinal logistic regression with multiple imputation, trial features with statistically significant associations with uncertainty expression included later year of publication (odds ratio [OR], 1.70; 95% CI, 1.24-2.32; P < .001), normalized P value (OR, 1.36; 95% CI, 1.11-1.67; P = .003), noncooperative group studies (OR, 1.72; 95% CI, 1.12-2.63; P = .01), and reporting an end point other than overall survival (OR, 1.41; 95% CI, 1.01-1.96; P = .047). Funding source, number of authors, journal impact tier, author nationality, study of unapproved drugs, abstract word count, whether the marginal end point was a primary or coprimary end point, and effect size (in subgroup analysis) did not have statistically significant associations with uncertainty expression.
    Conclusions and Relevance: Published oncology articles with marginally significant results may often incompletely convey uncertainty. Although it appears that more uncertainty is expressed in recent abstracts, full uncertainty expression remains uncommon, and seemingly is less common when reporting overall survival, results with P values lower than α levels, and cooperative group studies.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2019.17530
  10. J Med Syst. 2019 Dec 11. 44(1): 23
      Professor Peter L. Reichertz is one of the most significant pioneers in the field of medical informatics worldwide. In 1969, 50 years ago, he became Professor at the Hannover Medical School. On the occasion of this anniversary an attempt was made to report on the scientific work of Peter Reichertz and to reflect on this work in the light of medical informatics knowledge today. The aim of this study was to search publications listings in the Peter L. Reichertz Archive, in Pubmed/Medline, and in the Web of Science. As well as to analyse contents and communication approaches to help in classifying Peter Reichertz's scientific publications. Three comprehensive publication lists were identified: the Print Bibliography (384 publications), the Disc Bibliography (285 publications) and the Selected Publications Bibliography (111 publications). Based on the last bibliography, a classification was built along the semantic dimensions of (1) major topics, (2) fields of publication, and (3) publication languages. Major contents of Peter Reichertz's research in informatics were medical informatics as a field (including education), informatics applications in medicine and health care, and health information systems. Clear shifts over time were observed. To his research on informatics applications, in the 1970s health information systems was added as topic, which then became a major part of his research. While in the 1960s and earlier German was a major publication language, from the 1970s onwards this shifted to English as the major language. Peter Reichertz very early identified the potential of computers in medicine and health care. He did not just use information and communication technology and information processing methodology as if they were other technology, such as microscopes or ultrasonic devices, for improving diagnosis and therapy. He was visionary enough to very early see the revolutionary potential of informatics for biomedicine and health care, with consequential impact on research and education.
    Keywords:  Biomedical informatics; Health informatics; History; Medical informatics
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s10916-019-1463-6
  11. J Cardiovasc Med (Hagerstown). 2019 Dec 06.
       AIMS: The use of MitraClip (Abbott Vascular, Santa Clara, California, USA) for the treatment of severe functional mitral valve regurgitation (FMR) has drastically increased over recent years. We analysed the Worldwide and European interest on the MitraClip among Internet users performing a Google Trends-based analysis.
    METHODS: We conducted a retrospective analysis extracting the data from the cited Google Trends (https://trends.google.com) to explore both the worldwide and European interest in the MitraClip over recent years. Specifically, Google Trends was queried from 1 January 2008 to 31 September 2019 using the item 'MitraClip'.
    RESULTS: Over the study period, the worldwide interest in the MitraClip steadily increased by 47.7% per month (Ptrend < 0.001). The analysis performed among the 11 European countries in which the search volume allowed a trend to be created over the study period confirming an increasing significant interest. Specifically, the higher rate of interest increase per month was registered in France followed by Poland, Spain and Italy (40.5, 35.9, 37.3 and 31.8%, respectively).
    CONCLUSION: A growing interest in the MitraClip exists both in Europe and worldwide.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.2459/JCM.0000000000000916
  12. Expert Rev Proteomics. 2019 Dec 10.
      
    Keywords:  bibliometrics; human disease; molecular interaction; protein function; text-mining
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1080/14789450.2019.1703678
  13. JMIR Mhealth Uhealth. 2019 Dec 13. 7(12): e13311
       BACKGROUND: Research on digital technology to change health behavior has increased enormously in recent decades. Due to the interdisciplinary nature of this topic, knowledge and technologies from different research areas are required. Up to now, it is not clear how the knowledge from those fields is combined in actual applications. A comprehensive analysis that systematically maps and explores the use of knowledge within this emerging interdisciplinary field is required.
    OBJECTIVE: This study aims to provide an overview of the research area around the design and development of digital technologies for health behavior change and to explore trends and patterns.
    METHODS: A bibliometric analysis is used to provide an overview of the field, and a scoping review is presented to identify the trends and possible gaps. The study is based on the publications related to persuasive technologies and health behavior change in the last 18 years, as indexed by the Web of Science and Scopus (317 and 314 articles, respectively). In the first part, regional and time-based publishing trends; research fields and keyword co-occurrence networks; influential journals; and collaboration network between influential authors, countries, and institutions are examined. In the second part, the behavioral domains, technological means and theoretical foundations are investigated via a scoping review.
    RESULTS: The literature reviewed shows a clear and emerging trend after 2001 in technology-based behavior change, which grew exponentially after the introduction of the smartphone around 2009. Authors from the United States, Europe, and Australia have the highest number of publications in the field. The three most active research areas are computer science, public and occupational health, and psychology. The keyword "mhealth" was the dominant term and predominantly used together with the term "physical activity" and "ehealth". A total of three strong clusters of coauthors have been found. Nearly half of the total reported papers were published in three journals. The United States, the United Kingdom, and the Netherlands have the highest degree of author collaboration and a strong institutional network. Mobile phones were most often used as a technology platform, regardless of the targeted behavioral domain. Physical activity and healthy eating were the most frequently targeted behavioral domains. Most articles did not report about the behavior change techniques that were applied. Among the reported behavior change techniques, goal setting and self-management were the most frequently reported.
    CONCLUSIONS: Closer cooperation and interaction between behavioral sciences and technological areas is needed, so that theoretical knowledge and new technological advancements are better connected in actual applications. Eventually, this could result in a larger societal impact, an increase of the effectiveness of digital technologies for health behavioral change, and more insight in the relationship between behavioral change strategies and persuasive technologies' effectiveness.
    Keywords:  behavior change support systems; behavior change systems; bibliometric analysis; digital health behavior; persuasive technology; scoping review
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.2196/13311
  14. Curr Probl Diagn Radiol. 2019 Oct 31. pii: S0363-0188(19)30223-3. [Epub ahead of print]
       PURPOSE: To report scholarly metrics amongst academic endovascular specialists.
    MATERIAL AND METHODS: Faculty pages identified interventional radiologists and vascular surgeons at academic institutions. Members were classified as assistant, associate, or full professors. Scopus was used to extract publication and citation records. Data extracted included: number of publications, number of citations, h-index, i-10 index, hc-index, m-quotient, e-index, and g-index.
    RESULTS: Two hundred seventy six interventional radiologists and 266 vascular surgeons were included. Mean publications for interventional radiology assistant, associate, and full professors were 17.81, 48.77, and 131.65 and the citation counts were 311.45, 1051.08, and 3981.71, respectively. Mean publications for vascular surgeon assistant, associate, and full professors were 24.00, 48.7, and 161.37 and the citation counts were 414.33, 1147.89, and 5747.00, respectively. Multivariable proportional odds model for interventional radiologists showed a positive correlation between the academic rank and publication count (c = 0.028), h-index (c = 0.090), i10-index (c = 0.014), hc-index (c = 0.052), e-index (c = 0.016), and g-index (0.037). There was a negative correlation between m-quotient (c = -1.745) and citations (c = -0.001) and academic rank. Multivariable proportional odds model for vascular surgeons showed a positive correlation between the academic rank and publication count (c = 0.037) and g-index (c = 0.083). There was a negative correlation between m-quotient (c = -2.232) and hc-index (c = -0.065) and academic rank.
    CONCLUSION: Citation count and h-index are positively correlated while m-quotient is negatively correlated with academic performance for endovascular specialists.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1067/j.cpradiol.2019.10.010
  15. Dermatol Surg. 2019 Dec 11.
       BACKGROUND: Although gender disparities for those entering medicine have equalized, the number of women advancing in academia has remained low. Studies have demonstrated that women's representation at academic medical conferences has also remained low across multiple fields. Given that conference presentations and national reputation serve as metrics for academic promotion, women's representation at dermatology conferences may provide insight into women's academic productivity.
    OBJECTIVE: To examine the gender composition of presenters and speaking time at the 2 main national dermatologic surgery conferences.
    METHODS: Speaker's gender, presentation time, and topics were collected for 2009 to 2017 for the American College of Mohs Surgery (ACMS) and the American Society for Dermatologic Surgery (ASDS) Annual Meetings.
    RESULTS: Women had significantly fewer speaking opportunities and speaking minutes at both conferences. This disparity was most pronounced in reconstruction topics and least pronounced in cosmetics topics. The majority of top speakers, repeat speakers, and keynote speakers were men for both conferences. Oral abstracts showed no gender disparity at either conference.
    CONCLUSION: Women spoke less than men at both the ASDS and ACMS annual meetings over multiple years studied. Recently, this disparity in speaking opportunities has decreased. Further studies are needed to evaluate the speaking opportunities for women at other types of dermatology conferences.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1097/DSS.0000000000002275
  16. AIDS Rev. 2019 ;21(4): 184-194
      In recent years, there have been numerous calls by researchers to adopt multi-disciplinary and international perspectives to address the HIV pandemic. Meaningful and prudent public health policy should be based on sound empirical data and research. Henceforth, our study aims to contribute to the current literature by conducting a comprehensive global mapping and determine the landscapes of HIV/AIDS research covering the years between 1983 and 2017. Bibliometric and content analysis was used to describe trends in research productivity, usages, research collaborations, and clusters of research topics. Exploratory factor analysis, Jaccard's similarity index, and Ward dendrogram were applied to abstracts' contents to determine the development of interdisciplinary research landscapes. The United States of America continues to lead in research production and be main hub for author- and country-level collaborations. Research employing an epidemiological, social, and/or behavioral perspective for studying HIV/AIDS was found to dwarf in the presence of basic and biomedical HIV research. Interdisciplinary approaches to HIV research have been increasing with the creation of various research landscapes: strong constructs of studies examining health status, clinical responses, and HIV treatment, risk behaviors have been formed, while research topics relating to psycho-behavioral and cultural aspects as well as services have emerged along. To effectively prevent and control the disease, more researches are needed to provide culturally relevant and/or contextualized evidence of effective interventions. It is also necessary to enhance the ability and partnership of local researchers as well as invest in research infrastructure at national and regional levels to implement high-quality studies since they are the "gate-keepers" who could respond to local changes in a timely manner. These types of research could be a helpful guide for international donors, governments, and academicians to set up research priorities in target groups and settings, and to develop future research agendas globally.
    Keywords:  AIDS; Global; HIV; Interdisciplinary; Policy; Scientometrics
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.24875/AIDSRev.19000083
  17. Rev Esp Quimioter. 2019 Dec;pii: carabantes09dec2019. [Epub ahead of print]32(6): 571-576
      
    Keywords:  Highly Cited Researchers; Journal Citation Reports; Journal Impact Factor; Normalized Impact; Six Year Research Period
  18. Cells. 2019 Dec 06. pii: E1581. [Epub ahead of print]8(12):
      Recent studies have investigated the control of adipose tissue expansion and inflammatory process by microRNAs (miRNAs). These two processes are of great interest because both are associated with obesity and metabolic syndrome. However, despite the great relevance of the role of miRNAs in obesity and adipose tissue, no qualitative and quantitative analysis on the subject has been performed. Thus, we aimed to examine global research activity and current trends with respect to the interaction between obesity, adipose tissue and miRNAs through a bibliometric analysis. This research was performed on the Scopus database for publications containing miRNA, obesity, and adipose tissue keyword combinations. In total, 898 articles were analyzed and the most frequently occurring keywords were selected and clustered into three well-defined groups. As a result, first group of keywords pointed to the research area on miRNAs expressed in obesity-associated diseases. The second group demonstrated the regulation of the adipogenesis process by miRNAs, while the third group highlighted brown adipose tissue and thermogenesis as one of the latest global research trends related to the theme. The studies selected in this paper describe the expression and performance of different miRNAs in obesity and comorbidities. Most studies have focused on identifying miRNAs and signaling pathways associated with obesity, type 2 diabetes mellitus, and cardiovascular disease. Thus, the miRNA profile for these diseases may be used as biomarkers and therapeutic targets in the prevention and treatment of obesity-associated diseases.
    Keywords:  adipogenesis; adipose tissue; bibliometric analysis; microRNA; obesity
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.3390/cells8121581
  19. J Infect Public Health. 2019 Dec 06. pii: S1876-0341(19)30344-2. [Epub ahead of print]
       OBJECTIVE: The present bibliometric study aimed to identify and perform the analysis of top one hundred cited publications on Ramadan fasting and health.
    METHODS: The Web of Science database was searched for publication analyses of the papers published from January 2004 till June 2019. The search was performed using keywords "Ramadan" AND "Health" OR "Fast*". The descriptive analysis was performed using SPSS (version 20) software. The coauthor collaborations and keywords were analyzed using VOS viewer software (version 1.6.11).
    RESULTS: The present study found that the United Kingdom was the most productive country (n=15) followed by Turkey (n=13), Tunisia (n=12) and Saudi Arabia (n=11). The most prominent institution was National Center of Medicine and Science in Sports, Tunisia (n=7) followed by King Saud University, Saudi Arabia (n=6) and Loughborough University, United Kingdom (n=5).
    CONCLUSION: The most frequently occurring keywords in this analysis were Ramadan, fasting, exercise, Ramadan fasting and physical performance. The present study provides insight into the impactful papers pertaining to Ramadan fasting and associated health benefits.
    Keywords:  Bibliometrics; Fasting; Islam; Muslims; Public health
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jiph.2019.11.006
  20. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2019 Dec 06. pii: E4972. [Epub ahead of print]16(24):
      Slip and fall incidents at work remain an important class of injury and fatality causing mechanisms. An extensive body of safety research has accumulated on this topic. This article presents an analysis of this research domain. Two bibliometric visualization tools are applied: VOSviewer and HistCite. Samples of 618 slip and fall related articles are obtained from the Web of Science database. Networks of institutions, authors, terms, and chronological citation relationships are established. Collaboration and research activities of the slip and fall research community show that most contributors are from the United States, with the (now closed) Liberty Mutual Research Institute for Safety the most influential research organization. The results of a term clustering analysis show that the slip and fall research can be grouped into three sub-domains: epidemiology, gait/biomechanics, and tribology. Of these, early research focused mainly on tribology, whereas research on gait/biomechanics and epidemiological studies are relatively more recent. Psychological aspects of slip and fall incident occurrence represent a relatively under-investigated research topic, in which future contributions may provide new insights and safety improvements. Better linking of this research domain with other principles and methods in safety science, such as safety management and resilience, may also present valuable future development paths.
    Keywords:  HistCite; VOSviewer; bibliometric analysis; citation network; knowledge mapping; slip and fall
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph16244972
  21. Ann Dermatol Venereol. 2019 Dec 05. pii: S0151-9638(19)30996-2. [Epub ahead of print]
       INTRODUCTION: Dermatology journals and professional organizations are gradually opening up to social networks. We reviewed the activity of key accounts of dermatology journals and societies on Twitter and compared them specifically to the activity of French accounts.
    PATIENTS AND METHODS: This was an observational study on two given days, December 1, 2018 and May 3, 2019, involving 21 Twitter accounts of journals, of which all 17 were in dermatology, and 19 accounts of professional dermatology organizations, including 5 French accounts. The following data was collected: number of subscriptions, number of subscribers, total number of tweets, number of monthly tweets, and account activity (number of "likes", percentage of increase in subscribers and messages between the two studied periods). For the journals, we collected the 2017 Journal Impact Factor (WebofScience).
    RESULTS: The most popular dermatology journals on Twitter were JAMADermatology, JAAD and the BritishJournalofDermatology. There was a positive correlation between the impact factor and the number of subscribers (P=0.009, Pearson 0.714) and the number of tweets (P=0.001, Pearson 0.815), as well as a correlation between the number of subscribers and the number of tweets (P<0.001, Pearson 0.828). The American Dermatology Association, with two accounts, had 21,800 subscribers and 9814 subscribers. The Spanish Dermatology Association was second (6124 subscribers), ahead of the British (4833 subscribers). For France, the account with the most subscribers was that of the Union of Dermatologists-Venereologists (952 subscribers). The French Society of Dermatology had a modest 163 subscribers but was active, with a 47% increase in the number of tweets and a 49.5% increase in the number of subscribers. We found a positive correlation between the number of subscribers and the total number of tweets (P=0.006, Pearson 0.602) as well as the number of "likes" (P=0.02, Pearson 0.530). There was a correlation between the number of tweets and the number of "likes" (P<0.001, Pearson=0.897).
    CONCLUSION: There are many benefits for journals and professional associations in being present on social networks. However, we feel that there is striking under-use by French dermatology, as evidenced in the example of Twitter.
    Keywords:  Dermatologie; Dermatology; Dermatology journal; Dermatology societies; Journaux dermatologiques; Réseaux sociaux; Social media; Sociétés dermatologiques; Twitter
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annder.2019.10.020
  22. J Occup Med Toxicol. 2019 ;14 27
       Background: Aflatoxins are fungal metabolites associated with contaminated food products. Intake of aflatoxin-contaminated food results in serious health hazards and even death. Therefore, the aim of this study is to evaluate the global scientific output of research of aflatoxin by using bibliometric techniques.
    Methods: This bibliometric study was conducted using Scopus database and classified the retrieved publications were classified from different aspects, including the countries/region of focus, journals, authors, institutes, citations, and content analysis to discover any hot and emerging topics. In addition, the bibliometric analysis of the international collaborative network and hot research topics were generated by VOSviewer© software version 1.6.10. The publication period was restricted in the search for two decades (1998-2017).
    Results: The search engine of the Scopus database found 9845 documents published in the field of aflatoxin. The USA is the top publishing source in the world (22.85%), followed by China (11.85%), India (9.32%), and Italy (5.25%). In earlier years, researchers focused on terms related to the topics of "sources and biosynthesis of aflatoxin", "health effects by aflatoxin", and "detoxification and treatment of aflatoxin". However, in recent years, researchers pay more attention to the topic of detection and quantification of aflatoxin.
    Conclusions: The quantity of research in global aflatoxin has substantially increased over the past two decades. The evaluation of the historical status and development trend in aflatoxin scientific research can guide future research, and ultimately provide the basis for improving management procedures for governmental decisions, healthcare, industries, and educational institutions.
    Keywords:  Aflatoxin; Bibliometric; Scopus; VOSviewer
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1186/s12995-019-0248-7
  23. Environ Monit Assess. 2019 Dec 10. 192(1): 29
      Industrial parks, which are characterized as a group of industrial businesses designed to meet the concomitant demands of different organizations within an area, have played an important role in the national development strategies of many countries. Industrial parks have received increasingly more attention over time. Nevertheless, few scholars have visually analyzed global scientific data. This paper quantitatively and visually examines global academic research papers on industrial parks from 1987 to 2016 by using a bibliometric analysis. A total of 1823 papers from Science Citation Index Expanded and Social Sciences Citation Index databases were analyzed. The distributions of authorship, keywords, countries/territories, and institutes were generated. According to data from Science Citation Index Expanded and Social Sciences Citation Index databases, the top five most productive authors (i.e., Geng Y. with 22 articles, Fujita T. with 17, El-Halwagi M.M. with 15, Zhang Y. with 14, and Tan R.R. with 12) have contributed significantly to industrial park research. Papers on industrial park research have mainly been from China, the USA, and Taiwan. The dominant keywords from industrial park research from 1987 to 2016 are "China", "system", "heavy metal", and "eco-industrial park". These keywords will be the hot topics in industrial park research in the future. The research findings can provide a reference for understanding the research development process and trends in analyses in the field of industrial parks.
    Keywords:  Bibliometric analysis; Global academic publication; Industrial park; Literature review; Scientific documents; Web of Science
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-019-7993-z
  24. J Infect Public Health. 2019 Dec 09. pii: S1876-0341(19)30338-7. [Epub ahead of print]
       BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: This study provides a longitudinal scientometric analysis of global trypanosomiasis research between 1988 and 2017 as indexed in Clarivate Analytics' Web of Science (WoS). Contributions by researchers from different countries and continents are outlined based on publication productivity, international collaborations, citation analysis, and keyword analysis.
    METHODS: Bibliographic records of research publications indexed by WoS were downloaded based on a broad search of related terms. The authors compared the growth of literature by continent using 5-year increments, conducted a citation and co-authorship analysis by country, and a keyword analysis by publication using the scientometric visualization software VOSviewer.
    RESULTS: The trypanosomiasis research literature has seen more than a fourfold annual increase in production over the study period. Contributions by authors affiliated with European and South American countries proportionately account for the most research literature. The United States and Brazil, however, occupy central roles for citations and as national contributors to the literature. The terms 'trypanosomiasis cruzi' and 'chagas disease' have become more prominent, reflecting the regional growth of research from South America.
    INTERPRETATION AND CONCLUSION: Relative contributions from regions where the disease is prevalent show mixed developments. Contributions by African authors have declined proportionately to other areas of the world. However, South American contributions have increased during the study period. The contributing countries to the literature do not necessarily represent regions in which the diseases are prevalent. The same is true of the citation relationships, where European and North American contributions are more frequently cited.
    Keywords:  Citation analysis; Collaboration; Literature growth; Scientometrics; Trypanosoma; Trypanosomiasis
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jiph.2019.10.006