bims-evares Biomed News
on Evaluation of research
Issue of 2021‒01‒17
forty papers selected by
Thomas Krichel
Open Library Society


  1. JMIR Public Health Surveill. 2021 Jan 11. 7(1): e24569
      BACKGROUND: Universal health coverage (UHC) is one of many ambitious, health-related, sustainable development goals. Sharing various experiences of achieving UHC, in terms of challenges, pitfalls, and future prospects, can help policy and decision-makers reduce the likelihood of committing errors. As such, scholarly articles and technical reports are of paramount importance in shedding light on the determinants that make it possible to achieve UHC.OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study is to conduct a comprehensive analysis of UHC-related scientific literature from 1990 to 2019.
    METHODS: We carried out a bibliometric analysis of papers related to UHC published from January 1990 to September 2019 and indexed in Scopus via VOSviewer (version 1.6.13; CWTS). Relevant information was extracted: the number of papers published, the 20 authors with the highest number of publications in the field of UHC, the 20 journals with the highest number of publications related to UHC, the 20 most active funding sources for UHC-related research, the 20 institutes and research centers that have produced the highest number of UHC-related research papers, the 20 countries that contributed the most to the research field of UHC, the 20 most cited papers, and the latest available impact factors of journals in 2018 that included the UHC-related items under investigation.
    RESULTS: In our analysis, 7224 articles were included. The publication trend was increasing, showing high interest in the scientific community. Most researchers were from the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada, with Thailand being a notable exception. The Lancet accounted for 3.95% of published UHC-related research. Among the top 20 funding sources, the World Health Organization (WHO), the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) accounted for 1.41%, 1.34%, and 1.02% of published UHC-related research, respectively. The highest number of citations was found for articles published in The Lancet, the American Journal of Psychiatry, and the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). The top keywords were "health insurance," "insurance," "healthcare policy," "healthcare delivery," "economics," "priority," "healthcare cost," "organization and management," "health services accessibility," "reform," "public health," and "health policy."
    CONCLUSIONS: The findings of our study showed an increasing scholarly interest in UHC and related issues. However, most research concentrated in middle- and high-income regions and countries. Therefore, research in low-income countries should be promoted and supported, as this could enable a better understanding of the determinants of the barriers and obstacles to UHC achievement and improve global health.
    Keywords:  bibliometrics; developing countries; health coverage; low-income countries; scientometrics; universal health; universal health coverage
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.2196/24569
  2. J Thorac Dis. 2020 Dec;12(12): 7402-7415
      Bibliometric analysis can help us analyse the most influential papers, authors, research institutions in a discipline or topic and analyse the impact of these papers on a specific field. Our purpose is to identify the 100 most cited papers about thymic epithelial tumours (TETs) and analyse their key characteristics. We use certain search terms in the Web of Science database to identify the 100 most cited papers, and analysed the first author, country of the first author, institution, journal, type of paper, number of citations, and citation rate. The search returned 26,497 results. The top 100 papers received 17,674 citations. The most cited paper was by Masaoka et al. (n=1,190 citations), in which, clinical staging criteria are proposed for thymoma with special emphasis on the therapy and prognosis. The paper with the highest citation rate was also by Masaoka et al. (citations rate =30.51). Osaka University published the most papers (n=6) and accrued the highest number of citations (n=2,122 citations). The United States was the country with the most published papers (n=45) and the highest number of citations (n=7,991 citations). Cancer is the journal with the most published papers (n=19) and the highest number of citations (n=5,017 citations). Through the analysis of the most influential papers, this study provides a reference for researchers trying to understand TETs, thus providing guidance for future research.
    Keywords:  Thymic epithelial tumours (TETs); bibliometric analysis; citations; thymic tumour; thymoma
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.21037/jtd-20-2706
  3. Am J Obstet Gynecol MFM. 2021 Jan;pii: S2589-9333(20)30286-X. [Epub ahead of print]3(1): 100293
      BACKGROUND: The Relative Citation Ratio is a novel bibliometric tool that quantifies the impact of research articles. The objectives of this study were to identify the 100 obstetrics and gynecology articles with the highest relative citation ratios, evaluate how characteristics of these articles changed over time, and compare characteristics of these articles with top-cited obstetrics and gynecology articles.OBJECTIVE: We undertook a cross-sectional bibliometric study to examine the 100 obstetrics and gynecology articles with the highest relative citation ratios and the top 100 cited articles in the National Institutes of Health Open Citations Collection from 1980 to 2019.
    STUDY DESIGN: We identified every obstetrics and gynecology article published from 1980 to 2019 that was indexed in the National Institutes of Health Open Citations Collection. The top 100 articles with the highest relative citation ratios and the top 100 cited articles were selected for further review. Each article was evaluated using metrics of influence, translation, and other characteristics. We compared the top 100 articles with the highest relative citation ratios published from 1980 to 1999 versus 2000 to 2019 and characteristics of the top 100 articles with the highest relative citation ratios versus the top 100 top-cited articles (after excluding those on both lists). Means, standard deviations, and mean differences with corresponding 95% confidence intervals were calculated. Associations were expressed as relative risks (95% confidence interval).
    RESULTS: A total of 323,673 obstetrics and gynecology articles were published between 1980 and 2019. Among the top 100 articles with the highest relative citation ratios, most were observational studies (36%), reviews (26%), and consensus statements (21%). There were only 5 randomized clinical trials. Compared with the articles with the highest relative citation ratios published from 1980 to 1999, articles published from 2000 to 2019 were more likely about benign gynecology (relative risks, 1.3; 95% confidence interval, 0.6-2.8) and less likely about gynecology-oncology (relative risks, 0.6; 95% confidence interval, 0.2-1.9) and urogynecology (relative risks, 0.6; 95% confidence interval, 0.1-3.3). The articles after 2000 were more likely about systematic reviews (relative risks, 7.7; 95% confidence interval, 1.0-58.3) and consensus statements (relative risks, 5.1; 95% confidence intervals, 1.6-16.3) and were published as open access articles (relative risks, 1.3; 95% confidence interval, 0.9-2.0). There were 60 articles in common between the top 100 articles with the highest relative citation ratios and the top 100 cited articles. Compared with articles that were top cited (after excluding articles on both lists), articles with the highest relative citation ratios received fewer mean citations (266.9 [135.3] vs 514.3 [54.6]; mean differences, 247.4; 95% confidence interval, 201.5-293.3) but had higher numbers of citations per year (37.5 [4.1] vs 31.6 [8.1]; mean difference, -5.9; 95% confidence interval, -14.6 to -2.7). Compared with the articles with the highest relative citation ratios, top-cited articles were more likely to address gynecology topics (relative risk, 1.6; 95% confidence interval, 1.1-2.5), less likely to be randomized clinical trials (relative risk, 0.7; 95% confidence interval, 0.1-3.8), and less likely to be published as open access articles (relative risk, 0.52; 95% confidence interval, 0.31-0.86).
    CONCLUSION: The Relative Citation Ratio is a novel bibliometric tool that does not rely on absolute citation rates and provides unique insight into the dissemination of knowledge in obstetrics and gynecology. Nearly half of the influential obstetrics and gynecology articles identified with this metric would not have been recognized as citation classics by conventional bibliometric analysis.
    Keywords:  Relative Citation Ratio; bibliometrics; citation analysis; citation classics; obstetrics and gynecology; top cited
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ajogmf.2020.100293
  4. J Arthroplasty. 2020 Dec 03. pii: S0883-5403(20)31229-8. [Epub ahead of print]
      BACKGROUND: Unicompartmental knee arthroplasty (UKA) has been proven to be an effective surgical technique for unilateral compartment osteoarthritis. The purpose of this study is to identify and analyze the top 100 cited articles in the field of UKA research.METHODS: Publications on UKA from 1980 to 2020 in the Web of Science database were retrieved. The characteristics of the top 100 cited articles were analyzed, including information of publications and citations, level of evidence, and research interests.
    RESULTS: The number of publications and citations increased over time. The majority of the highly cited articles were from the Nuffield Orthopedic Centre (Oxford, England) and the Brigham and Women's Hospital (Boston, USA). Long-term outcome of UKA and comparison between UKA and TKA gathered most research interests. The most frequently occurring keywords were "survival" and "revision." Since 2012, "life quality" and "robotics" have been used. There was no level I evidence, and most studies provided level IV evidence.
    CONCLUSION: There was a rising trend in publications and citations in the field of UKA research, the majority of them were from a few centers, and were low-level evidence. Most studies focused on the long-term outcomes of UKA; in recent years, patient satisfaction and navigation surgery have become new research trends.
    Keywords:  arthroplasty; bibliometric analysis; knee; top cited articles; unicompartmental
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.arth.2020.11.038
  5. J Adv Nurs. 2021 Jan 15.
      AIMS: The study aims to carry out a bibliometric analysis of the research on magnet hospital from 1988-2020.DESIGN: A statistical and visualization bibliometric analysis was conducted between February-May 2020.
    METHODS: The information was extracted from Web of Science by the topic advanced search strategy. HistCite-Pro, Excel, GunnMap, BibExcel and VOSviewer were used to extract, integrate and visualize the bibliometric information. Furthermore, the research contents of the core-authors were explored and summarized by reviewing all the published articles.
    RESULTS: Articles (N = 396) published in 107 journals were retrieved in the Web of Science from 1988-2020. The USA (N = 319) and University of Pennsylvania (N = 38) were the most productive country and institution respectively. Author co-citation and bibliographic-coupling network analysis identified that Aiken, Kramer, Laschinger, Schmalenberg, Lake and Johantgen were the major contributors and leaders in this field. According to the research content of the main contributors and keyword co-occurrence analysis result, the research focus could be divided into four parts: the mechanism leading to the outcomes differences for magnet hospital, the evidence-based practice, the outcomes comparison between magnet hospital and non-magnet hospital and the practice environment.
    CONCLUSION: This bibliometric study offered a comprehensive overview of current study status of magnet hospital and this area has been drawn increasing attention over the years. However, the research on magnet hospital is still relative limited and needs to be paid more attention, especially in developing countries.
    IMPACT: This study showed the most contributed countries, journals, institutions, authors and the main themes related to magnet hospital, which would help researchers find potential partners, optimize and deepen future research, such as enhancing the magnet hospital research in developing countries, improving the evidence-based research and considering the impact caused by different culture. Furthermore, this study can also give suggestions for magnet hospital policy makers.
    Keywords:  bibliometric analysis; citation network; collaborative network; magnet hospital; nurses; nursing; patient outcomes; thematic trends; web of science
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/jan.14757
  6. Hematol Transfus Cell Ther. 2020 Dec 28. pii: S2531-1379(20)31305-5. [Epub ahead of print]
      INTRODUCTION: Sickle cell disease is an autosomal recessive genetic disease caused by a single point mutation in the β-globin chain of the hemoglobin. It has been recognized by the World Health Organization as a public health priority since 2006.METHODS: The Scopus database was used in this study with the search descriptors: "sickle cell" and "sickle cell disease". We applied common bibliometric indicators to evaluate the trend in scientific literature in sickle cell disease research.
    RESULTS: We retrieved a total of 19,921 pieces of scientific literature in the repertoire from 1997 to 2017. The Price law was fulfilled in the trend of production of scientific literature on SCD as the growth of scientific literature was more exponential (r=0.9751; r2=0.9509) than linear (r=0.9721; r2=0.9449). We observed a duplication time of 4.52 years. The Bradford core was made up of 69 journals with Blood at the top, publishing the greatest number of articles. The most productive institutions were mostly United States agencies and hospitals. The United States was the most productive country. The National Institute of Health was the most productive institution and also had the highest number of citations. Vichinsky E was the most productive author, while the most cited article was published by Circulation.
    CONCLUSION: The growth of scientific literature in Sickle cell disease was found to be high. However, the exponential growth trend shows a "yet-to-be-explored" area of research. This study will be useful for physicians, researchers, research funders and policy-cum-decision makers.
    Keywords:  Bibliometric analysis; Sickle cell; Sickle cell anemia; Sickle cell disease
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.htct.2020.09.156
  7. Asian J Psychiatr. 2020 Dec 15. pii: S1876-2018(20)30634-1. [Epub ahead of print]56 102521
      The present study examined India's publications (2803) on schizophrenia, using various bibliometric indicators during 1990-2019. The study focuses on the number of publications, and citations received by the papers on schizophrenia, published by authors affiliated to Indian institutes by using Scopus data base. Additionally, an attempt was made to evaluate the performance of India's leading organizations and authors, and inter-collaborative linkages between them. Scopus database include publications of Indian Journal of Psychiatry and Indian Journal of Psychological Medicine from 2009 and 2011. Accordingly, the publications in these journals were included after these years. Analysis of the publications showed that India is globally ranked at 13th position in number of publications on schizophrenia with 2.04 % global share, depicting 14.21 % annual growth, with 22.8 % of publications having international collaboration. Publications from India published during the period of 1990-2019, registered a citation impact per paper (CPP) of 13.3. National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences, Bangalore (671 papers), Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh (271 papers) and Central Instittue of Psychiatry, Ranchi (136 papers) were the most productive institutes. However, the most impactful organizations in terms of citation per paper (CPP) and relative citation index (RCI), Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore (77.27 CPP and 5.78 RCI), Schizophrenia Research Foundation, Chennai (31.16 CPP and 2.55 RCI) and Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi (29.21 CPP and 2.18 RCI) were at the top. In terms of Individual authors, G. Venkatasubramanian (180 papers), and B.N. Gangadhar (162 papers) were the most productive authors and R.Thara (31.87 CPP and 2.38 RCI), B.K. Thelma (24.0 CPP and 1.8 RCI), M.S. Keshavan (23.91 CPP and 1.79 RCI) were the most impactful authors, among the top 15 authors. The journals which reported comparatively higher productivity for Indian publications included Indian Journal of Psychiatry (242 papers), followed by Asian Journal of Psychiatry (214 papers) and Indian Journal of Psychological Medicine (103 papers). In terms of most impactful Indian publications, these were published in The Lancet (97.7), Progress in Neuro Psychopharmacology & Biological Psychiatry (50) and Schizophrenia Bulletin (44.67).
    Keywords:  Bibliometrics; Indian publications; Mental disorders; Schizophrenia disorder; Scientometrics
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ajp.2020.102521
  8. Int J Dent. 2020 ;2020 8881352
      Background: In the modern tech-savvy era, scientific literature publication remains the optimal way to disperse knowledge, even if it has transformed from print to mostly electronic. With the new and improved publication methods, also come more scrutiny and analytic criticism of the scientific work. It becomes even more important in this context to rectify flawed scientific work responsibly. This present study was undertaken to help clarify the process and causes of retractions occurring in the dental community and analyse its reasons. Methodology. A total of 8092 PubMed indexed articles were scanned from the online libraries, and individually scanning for author details, place of study, subspecialty of research, funding, dates of original publication, and retraction notices issued along with journal specifics such as type and impact factors, country of publishing was compiled and analysed by two authors. The dataset was then collaboratively analysed using Panda's Library in Python software as an analysis tool for data preparation and for frequency analysis. The estimates were presented as mean differences (MD) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CI).Results: The present study had a compiled dataset of 198 articles after screening and revealed that maximum retractions of dentistry-related research originated from India (25.3%) and, on average, took 2.6 years to be issued a retraction notice. We also deciphered that the USA retracted maximum dental articles (34.8%), and plagiarism was cited as the most common (38.02%) reason for doing so. The present study also brought to light that there was a trend for lower impact factor-dental journals in retracting maximum articles, most of which were nonfunded (62.16%). The results signify that 63.78% of all retracted papers continued to be cited postretractions.
    Conclusions: The retractions happening in the field of dental literature are currently too time-consuming and often unclear to the readers. The authors would like to conclude that the retracted papers were mostly from India and Spain mostly related to endodontics or prosthodontic research. All of this warrants the need for better scrutiny and reforms in the area.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1155/2020/8881352
  9. Arch Public Health. 2021 Jan 12. 79(1): 6
      BACKGROUND: Community engagement (CE) has been regarded as a critical element of successful health programs to achieve "the health for all" goals. Numerous studies have shown that it plays a significant role in reducing inequalities, improving social justice, enhancing benefits, and sharing responsibility towards public health. Despite this, the extant literature of community engagement in public health (CEPH) has topic-focused boundaries and is scattered across disciplinary. Large-scale studies are needed to systematically identify current status, hotspots, knowledge structure, dynamic trends, and future developments in this field.METHODS: The bibliometric techniques were applied in the analysis of publications on CEPH in Web of Science Core Collection from Thomson Reuters. One thousand one hundred two papers out of 70.8 million publications over the period of 1980 to 2020 and their 15,116 references were retrieved as the sample set. First, basic characteristics of publications, including distributions of geography, journals and categories, productive authors and frequently cited articles, etc. were obtained. Then, four bibliometric methods, i.e. social network analysis, co-citation analysis, co-occurrence clustering, and burst detection, were further conducted to sketch the contours of the structure and evolution of CEPH.
    RESULTS: Between Jan 1, 1980, and Apr 25, 2020, CEPH has attracted a sharp increase in interest all over the world. Total 117 countries or regions have participated in the field of CEPH and the contributions are geographically and institutionally distinct. The United States is the key region performing such research, which accounts for more than half of the total number of publications. Developing countries, such as South Africa, India, Brazil and China also contributed a lot. The advancements of CEPH are marked by historically momentous public health events and evolved from macroscopic strategies to mesoscopic and microscopic actions. Based on keyword clustering and co-citation clustering, we propose a 4O (i.e. orientation, object, operation, and outcome) framework of CEPH to facilitate a better understanding of the current global achievements and an elaborate structuring of developments in the future.
    CONCLUSION: This study draws an outline of the global review on the contemporary and cross-disciplinary research of CEPH which might present an opportunity to take stock and understand the march of knowledge as well as the logical venation underlying research activities which are fundamental to inform policy making.
    Keywords:  Bibliometric; Community engagement; Public health; Visualization
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1186/s13690-021-00525-3
  10. Dev World Bioeth. 2021 Jan 13.
      This study aims at increasing our understanding of the research activities of Iranian researchers and institutions in the field of biomedical ethics from 1995 to 2015. A combination of bibliometrics and social network analysis was used to examine the bibliographic data of 580 documents published on Iranian biomedical ethics in Web of Science and Scopus databases to investigate the publication trend, scientific impact, subject keywords network, and social network analysis indicators for international and cross-institutional co-authorship networks. The results showed that the publication of documents has had a consistent and increasing growth and that the citation trend has grown along with it. The analysis of thematic clusters by keyword co-occurrence network shows that Iranian biomedical ethics research has dealt with various topics and that has introduced different research directions. Researchers from 28 countries were identified in the international collaboration network. The main partners of Iranian researchers were from the US (17.8%) and the UK (9.2%). However, there is a tendency to develop and complete cooperation with researchers from different countries. The cross-institutional collaboration network comprises of 63 institutes, of which Tehran University of Medical Sciences (38%), Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences (11%) and Shiraz University of Medical Sciences (7%) have the largest share in publishing documents. The superiority of the first two universities based on centralization indicators in the cross-institutional collaboration network has caused the exchange of cross-network knowledge between and via these players. The network density indicator shows that almost half of the co-authorship links within the international collaboration network and 8% of the co-authorship links within the cross-institutional collaboration network have been implemented and that these networks are not very coherent.
    Keywords:  Iranian scientific productions; bibliometrics; biomedical ethics; co-authorship network; social network analysis
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/dewb.12306
  11. Rev Gastroenterol Mex. 2021 Jan 12. pii: S0375-0906(20)30152-X. [Epub ahead of print]
      INTRODUCTION AND AIM: The Revista de Gastroenterología de México (RGM), founded in 1935, is one of the most influential journals of scientific dissemination in Mexico and Latin America. The aim of the present review was to characterize the RGM's most frequently cited original articles, review articles, and consensuses.METHODS: The most cited original articles, review articles, and consensuses of the RGM were identified using the Scopus, PubMed, and Google Scholar databases. Their designs and topics, as well as their authors and participating institutions, were analyzed.
    RESULTS: The most highly cited articles of the RGM corresponded to the period from 1996 to 2018, with a mean of 16.5 citations per article. Fifty-eight percent (n = 29) of the articles belonged to the area of gastroenterology and 20% (n = 10) to surgery. The most frequent topics were functional gastrointestinal disorders, hepatitis virus, and gastric cancer. Thirty-six percent of the articles had a nonrandomized prospective design, followed by cross-sectional studies (26%) and randomized prospective studies (18%).
    CONCLUSION: The 50 most-cited articles included a total of 826 citations and the 10 most-cited consensuses and review articles had a total of 208 citations. Those studies encompass a diversity of disciplines related to gastroenterology that have impacted the scientific community and correspond to the work of different active research groups in Mexico and other countries.
    Keywords:  Articles; Artículos; Gastroenterology; Gastroenterología; Journals; Most-cited; Más-citados; Revistas
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rgmx.2020.10.002
  12. Front Oncol. 2020 ;10 607777
      Background: There is an unmet need to assess research productivity from southeast Asia (SEA) regarding primary central nervous system (CNS) tumors. The country's economy, landscape of neurology practice, and disease burden are hypothesized to correlate with scientific output. This study aimed to objectively measure the impact of published studies on primary brain tumors in SEA and to assess for correlation with socioeconomic determinants and burden of disease.Methods: We systematically searched electronic databases for relevant articles from SEA on primary CNS tumor until July 31, 2020. Bibliometric indices were reported and subjected to correlational analysis with population size, gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, percentage (%) GDP for research and development (R&D), total number of neurologists, disease incidence, deaths, and disability-adjusted life years.
    Results: A total of 549 articles were included, consisting primarily of case reports (n=187, 34.06%) and discussed gliomas (n=195, 35.52%). Singapore published the most number of the articles (n=246, 44.8%). Statistical analysis showed a positive correlation between %GDP for R&D and total publication. Additionally, negative relationships were noted between burden of disease and total neurologist with most bibliometric indices. However, GDP per capita was not correlated with measures for research productivity.
    Conclusion: The low impact of scientific output on primary CNS tumors in SEA does not address the growing epidemiology and burden of this disease. An increase in the GDP growth and financial and manpower investment to R&D may significantly improve research productivity in SEA.
    Keywords:  Southeast Asia; bibliometric analysis; brain tumor; burden of disease; research productivity; socioeconomic factors
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.3389/fonc.2020.607777
  13. Neural Regen Res. 2021 Aug;16(8): 1628-1637
      There are two types of cell death-apoptosis and necrosis. Apoptosis is cell death regulated by cell signaling pathways, while necrosis has until recently been considered a passive mechanism of cell death caused by environmental pressures. However, recent studies show that necrosis can also be regulated by specific cell signaling pathways. This mode of death, termed necroptosis, has been found to be related to the occurrence and development of many diseases. We used bibliometrics to analyze the global output of literature on necroptosis in the field of neuroscience published in the period 2007-2019 to identify research hotspots and prospects. We included 145 necroptosis-related publications and 2239 references published in the Web of Science during 2007-2019. Visualization analysis revealed that the number of publications related to necroptosis has increased year by year, reaching a peak in 2019. China is the country with the largest number of publications. Key word and literature analyses demonstrated that mitochondrial function change, stroke, ischemia/reperfusion and neuroinflammation are likely the research hotspots and future directions of necroptosis research in the nervous system. The relationship between immune response-related factors, damage-associated molecular patterns, pathogen-associated molecular patterns and necroptosis may become a potential research hotspot in the future. Taken together, our findings suggest that although the inherent limitations of bibliometrics may affect the accuracy of the literature-based prediction of research hotspots, the results obtained from the included publications can provide a reference for the study of necroptosis in the field of neuroscience.
    Keywords:  CiteSpace; VOSviewer; Web of Science ; bibliometric analysis; citations; h-index; necroptosis; network analysis; neuroscience; output
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.4103/1673-5374.303032
  14. Br J Sociol. 2021 Jan 09.
      Kimberlé Crenshaw coined the term "intersectionality" in 1989 as a critique of feminist and critical race scholarship's neglect of-respectively-race and gender. Since then, the concept has been interpreted and reinterpreted to appeal to new disciplinary, geographical, and sociocultural audiences, generating heated debates over its appropriation and continued political significance. Drawing on all 3,807 publications in Scopus that contain the word "intersectionality" in the title, abstract, or keywords, we map the spread of intersectionality in academia through its citations. Network analysis reveals the contours of its diffusion among the 6,098 scholars in our data set, while automated text analysis, manual coding, and the close reading of publications reveal how the application and interpretation of intersectional thinking has evolved over time and space. We find that the diffusion network exhibits communities that are not well demarcated by either discipline or geography. Communities form around one or a few highly referenced scholars who introduce intersectionality to new audiences while reinterpreting it in a way that speaks to their research interests. By examining the microscopic interactions of publications and citations, our complex systems approach is able to identify the macroscopic patterns of a controversial concept's diffusion.
    Keywords:  complexity science; diffusion; feminism; intersectionality; sociology of knowledge; women's studies
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-4446.12816
  15. Ann Surg Oncol. 2021 Jan 11.
      BACKGROUND: The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is the primary public funding source for surgical research in the United States. Surgical oncology is a highly academic career, but NIH funding for surgical oncologists (SOs) is not well characterized.METHODS: The NIH RePORTER (Research Portfolio Online Reporting Tools Expenditures and Results) was queried to identify R01-and-equivalents grants awarded to departments of surgery (DoS) between 2008 and 2018. Surgical oncologists were considered to be those who completed a Society of Surgical Oncology (SSO)-accredited fellowship (breast or complex surgical oncology).
    RESULTS: Of 1101 projects, 510 (46.3%) were led by practicing surgeons. Among these, general surgeons accounted for most grants (31%), followed by SOs (20.8%). Women represented 211 (24.1%) of the grantees. However, SOs had a higher proportion of female investigators than other surgeons (30.0% vs. 16.1%; P = 0.001). The SO grantees had fewer years of experience (YoE) (12 years; interquartile range [IQR], 8.75 vs. 13 years; IQR, 13 years; P = 0.003), lower senior status (≥ 24 YoE), fewer investigators (4.0% vs. 18.9%; P < 0.001), and fewer PhD holders (30.8% vs. 65.5%; P < 0.001) than the overall cohort. Projects led by SOs accounted for 1121 publications (14.1%), with a higher proportion of high-impact articles (26.3% vs. 9.7%; P < 0.001), and were more likely to hold a registered patent (odds ratio [OR], 3.30; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.24-8.74; P = 0.016).
    CONCLUSION: Among surgical subspecialties, SSO-accredited surgeons accounted for the largest share of the NIH grants. The SO grantees were younger in their career and had higher-impact scholarly productivity. A smaller proportion of female SOs received NIH grants than males, but this gender disparity was less significant among SOs than among other surgical specialties. Fellowship programs should continue to stimulate groundbreaking research by integrating grant-writing training and mentorship.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1245/s10434-020-09495-2
  16. Scientometrics. 2021 Jan 04. 1-42
      Research universities have a strong devotion and advocacy for research in their core academic mission. This is why they are widely recognized for their excellence in research which make them take the most renowned positions in the different worldwide university leagues. In order to examine the uniqueness of this group of universities we analyze the scientific production of a sample of them in a 5 year period of time. On the one hand, we analyze their preferences in research measured with the relative percentage of publications in the different subject areas, and on the other hand, we calculate the similarity between them in research preferences. In order to select a set of research universities, we studied the leading university rankings of Shanghai, QS, Leiden, and Times Higher Education (THE). Although the four rankings own well established and developed methodologies and hold great prestige, we choose to use THE because data were readily available for doing the study we had in mind. Having done that, we selected the twenty academic institutions ranked with the highest score in the last edition of THE World University Rankings 2020 and to contrast their impact, we also, we compared them with the twenty institutions with the lowest score in this ranking. At the same time, we extracted publication data from Scopus database for each university and we applied bibliometrics indicators from Elsevier's SciVal. We applied the statistical techniques cosine similarity and agglomerative hierarchical clustering analysis to examine and compare affinities in research preferences among them. Moreover, a cluster analysis through VOSviewer was done to classify the total scientific production in the four major fields (health sciences, physical sciences, life sciences and social sciences). As expected, the results showed that top universities have strong research profiles, becoming the leaders in the world in those areas and cosine similarity pointed out that some are more affine among them than others. The results provide clues for enhancing existing collaboration, defining and re-directing lines of research, and seeking for new partnerships to face the current pandemic to find was to tackle down the covid-19 outbreak.
    Keywords:  Cosine similarity; Hierarchical clustering; Higher education institutions; Research preferences; Research universities; Scientific production
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-020-03790-1
  17. Ir J Med Sci. 2021 Jan 11.
      BACKGROUND AND AIMS: While there is an increasing emphasis on the value of interdisciplinarity in scholarship in the medical humanities, it is unknown to what extent there is joint working between historians and clinicians in medical history. We aimed to quantify evidence of joint working in authorship of medical history papers.METHODS: Observational survey of authorship. We studied authorship data in all papers published in the three major medical history journals between 2009 and 2019 (n = 634).
    RESULTS: The majority of medical history papers is written by single authors with single disciplinary affiliations (68%), most commonly history (65%): fewer than one paper in seven (14%) shows evidence of joint working between disciplines in authorship. A minority of papers (8%) are written by authors with primary medical affiliations. Almost three-quarters (71%) of papers have an acknowledgements section, but only 6% shows clear evidence of joint working between disciplines in the acknowledgements.
    CONCLUSIONS: Scholarship engaging both historians and clinicians is rare in medical history journals. Possible solutions include enhanced research collaborations between historians and clinicians, interdisciplinary educational seminars and cross-institutional knowledge exchanges.
    Keywords:  Authorship; Bibliometric analysis; History of medicine; Interdisciplinary studies
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s11845-021-02511-8
  18. Retina. 2021 Jan 07.
      PURPOSE: To assess for a positive results bias in recently published randomized controlled trials (RCTs) in the field of vitreoretinal disease.Methods: A bibliometric analysis was conducted examining RCTs published in the field of retina between January 1, 2016, and December 31, 2019. Studies were classified as positive result or negative result based on the statistical significance of their primary outcome. Publication date and sample size were documented. These variables were compared against Journal Citation Reports Impact Factor in the year of publication.Results: 288 RCTs from 64 unique journals were included and analyzed. 185 (64.2%) studies were classified as positive result, and 103 (35.8%) studies were classified as negative result. There was no association between impact factor and positive result. Studies classified as positive result had larger sample sizes, and higher sample size was associated with higher impact factor.CONCLUSION: These results do not support the presence of a recent positive results bias in retina RCTs. This is reassuring, although several factors could be contributing to this finding including studies that were conducted but never submitted and selective reporting of outcomes. Thus, it will be important to remain cognizant of potential publication biases moving forward.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1097/IAE.0000000000003107
  19. Environ Monit Assess. 2021 Jan 13. 193(2): 59
      Indigenous people constitute an important section of society in many countries. Despite being a numerically smaller section, they are culturally diverse and distributed mostly in valuable natural resources-rich regions worldwide. In the era of globalization, industrialization, and trade liberalization, indigenous communities have become more vulnerable to displacement, land alienation, cultural erosion, and social exclusion. During the last few decades, researchers have tried to evaluate and document their problems and prospects. The present study analyzes the trends and characteristics of research and development conducted about indigenous communities. The research hotspots based on keywords, productive researchers, and journals during 1979-2020 were mapped using the Scopus database. The analysis was carried out using the bibliometrix R-package and VOSviewer software tool. Consistent growth in the number of studies and citations on indigenous communities concerning environmental conservation, natural resources, and economic development was observed during the last four decades. The present findings reveal that research on the indigenous community has attracted the attention of the scientific community in recent years. Qualitative studies with methodological rigor, having potential for social and policy implications, are warranted to understand and respect ingrained cultural and socio-economic diversity among these communities. Graphical abstract.
    Keywords:  Bibliographic databases; Cocitation; Science mapping; Scientometrics; VOSviewer; Workflow
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-020-08793-2
  20. Med J Islam Repub Iran. 2020 ;34 142
      Background: The emergence of web 2.0 and development of social media have strongly affected sharing, collaborating, connecting, and evaluating in academic setting. This study aimed to provide a clear image of faculty members' activities at Iran University of Medical Sciences (IUMS) and the way they communicate with the academic world in ResearchGate (RG). Methods: In this altmetrics study, we surveyed the presence and activity of IUMS faculty members in RG and compared the data with those derived from Google Scholar and Scopus. The Spearman's correlation coefficient was used to detect the correlation between RG variables and the 2 mentioned databases. The significance level was set at α = 0.01. Data were statistically analyzed using the Microsoft Excel 2013 and SPSS 22.0 software. Results: The results demonstrated 439 (45%) faculty members of IUMS had RG profiles, and the School of Medicine with 287 researchers had the largest contribution. Overall, 14 971 documents were shared, 91% of which were journal articles. The average RG score was 15.26 ± 9.28, of which 94% was acquired from publications. This indicates a positive and strong correlation between RG variables and Scopus and Google Scholar indicators, while the RG indicators were more correlated with Google Scholar than Scopus. Conclusion: Due to the essential role of self-archiving in the visibility, citation rate, and creation of further international collaborations, it is recommended that Iranian scholars consider using the Academic Social Networks like RG to enhance their online international contributions.
    Keywords:  ASNs; Academic Contribution; Academic Social Networks; Altmetrics; Google Scholar; IUMS; Iran; Iran University of Medical Sciences; RG; ResearchGate; Scopus
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.34171/mjiri.34.142
  21. Orthop J Sports Med. 2020 Dec;8(12): 2325967120973645
      Background: The anterolateral ligament (ALL) of the knee remains a topic of interest. All aspects of the ligament, including its anatomy, biomechanics, imaging, and clinical importance, are areas for research among knee surgeons.Purpose: To evaluate the trends in research on the ALL of the knee, as indicated by studies indexed in PubMed from 2010 to 2019.
    Study Design: Cross-sectional study.
    Methods: We searched PubMed for article titles from January 1, 2010, to December 31, 2019, that included the term "anterolateral ligament." The initial search was performed with the terms "anterolateral ligament AND knee" and "anterolateral ligament NOT knee." Next, we performed a search using "anterolateral complex OR anterolateral reconstruction OR lateral extra-articular tenodesis" to avoid missing any studies. A bibliometric evaluation was performed for the search results, and we noted the characteristics of the most cited articles in PubMed.
    Results: Published studies on the ALL peaked in 2017, with 56 studies, and then declined from 2017 to 2019. The 3 leading journals with articles on the ALL were Arthroscopy; Knee Surgery, Sports Traumatology, Arthroscopy; and The American Journal of Sports Medicine. Cadaveric anatomic, cadaveric biomechanical, and clinical imaging studies of the ALL were the most common types of studies published from 2010 to 2019. Clinical studies on the ALL consisted of 18 articles, with the majority displaying a low level of evidence.
    Conclusion: Cadaveric anatomic/histological, cadaveric biomechanical, and clinical imaging studies of the ALL were the most commonly published studies from 2010 to 2019. More clinical outcome studies with a high level of evidence are needed to increase the supporting data for the future practice of ALL reconstruction.
    Keywords:  PubMed; anterolateral ligament; knee; publication trend
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1177/2325967120973645
  22. JMIR Med Inform. 2021 Jan 11. 9(1): e23562
      BACKGROUND: Interdisciplinary research is an important feature of precision medicine. However, the accurate cross-disciplinary status of precision medicine is still unclear.OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study is to present the nature of interdisciplinary collaboration in precision medicine based on co-occurrences and social network analysis.
    METHODS: A total of 7544 studies about precision medicine, published between 2010 and 2019, were collected from the Web of Science database. We analyzed interdisciplinarity with descriptive statistics, co-occurrence analysis, and social network analysis. An evolutionary graph and strategic diagram were created to clarify the development of streams and trends in disciplinary communities.
    RESULTS: The results indicate that 105 disciplines are involved in precision medicine research and cover a wide range. However, the disciplinary distribution is unbalanced. Current cross-disciplinary collaboration in precision medicine mainly focuses on clinical application and technology-associated disciplines. The characteristics of the disciplinary collaboration network are as follows: (1) disciplinary cooperation in precision medicine is not mature or centralized; (2) the leading disciplines are absent; (3) the pattern of disciplinary cooperation is mostly indirect rather than direct. There are 7 interdisciplinary communities in the precision medicine collaboration network; however, their positions in the network differ. Community 4, with disciplines such as genetics and heredity in the core position, is the most central and cooperative discipline in the interdisciplinary network. This indicates that Community 4 represents a relatively mature direction in interdisciplinary cooperation in precision medicine. Finally, according to the evolution graph, we clearly present the development streams of disciplinary collaborations in precision medicine. We describe the scale and the time frame for development trends and distributions in detail. Importantly, we use evolution graphs to accurately estimate the developmental trend of precision medicine, such as biological big data processing, molecular imaging, and widespread clinical applications.
    CONCLUSIONS: This study can help researchers, clinicians, and policymakers comprehensively understand the overall network of interdisciplinary cooperation in precision medicine. More importantly, we quantitatively and precisely present the history of interdisciplinary cooperation and accurately predict the developing trends of interdisciplinary cooperation in precision medicine.
    Keywords:  co-occurrence analysis; interdisciplinary; precision medicine; social network analysis
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.2196/23562
  23. Zool Res. 2021 Jan 18. pii: 2095-8137(2021)01-0001-02. [Epub ahead of print]42(1): 1-2
      Since its establishment in 1980, Zoological Research ( ZR) has walked with many scientists during their academic careers (Yao & Zhang, 2015; Yao et al., 2019). During this joyful holiday season and hopeful new year, we are incredibly pleased to share our wonderful news with all authors, readers, editorial board members, and peer reviewers of ZR. Due to its growing academic influence over the last several years, ZR has attained its highest impact factor to date, reaching 2.638 by the end of 2019 (Q1, 12th/169 SCI journals). Furthermore, its current CiteScore has reached 4.3 (as of December 2020), a nearly 60% increase since 2019. Meanwhile, both the publishing capacity and efficiency of ZR have continued to expand. We are immensely proud of each of our efforts in promoting ZR. Of note, your enduring support and faith have helped drive the sustained growth and advancement of ZR, which continues to evolve as a prominent journal in the zoological field.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.24272/j.issn.2095-8137.2020.331
  24. J Am Acad Dermatol. 2021 Jan 08. pii: S0190-9622(21)00084-0. [Epub ahead of print]
      
    Keywords:  Altmetric; PlumX; altmetrics; impact factor; melanoma; oncology; social media
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaad.2020.12.067
  25. Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2021 Jan 16.
      Atrazine (ATZ) is one of the most widely used herbicides in the world. A scientometric study was conducted to analyze the evolution of research on ATZ. The study also looked at the use of microalgae and cyanobacteria as biological models for toxicity tests during the period from 1959 to 2019, in the category of toxicology of Web of Science. The results show an increase in the number of scientific publications mainly in the USA, Canada, and China. The majority of papers was published in journals with high impact factors, demonstrating the relevance of such studies. About 83% of the studies aimed to evaluate the effect of ATZ on non-target organisms. From those, 7.5% included microalgae and cyanobacteria. The majority of them worked with chlorophyceae to perform toxicity bioassays of ATZ and analyze its sublethal effects. The gaps identified by this analysis included a small number of collaborations between research groups from different countries; the number of studies with terrestrial organisms, which are larger in comparison to aquatic organisms; and the fact that none of the studies with ATZ and microalgae was performed in the field. These findings can point out to researchers and funding agencies the gaps in knowledge on the toxic effects of ATZ and guide the development of new research projects as well as environmental policies.
    Keywords:  Chlorophyceae; Pesticide; Pollution; Research productivity; Toxicity; Web of Science
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-020-12213-w
  26. Neurocrit Care. 2021 Jan 13.
      BACKGROUND: Several recent studies across the field of medicine have indicated gender disparity in the reception of prestigious awards and research grants, placing women in medicine at a distinct disadvantage. Gender disparity has been observed in neurology, critical care medicine and within various professional societies. In this study, we have examined the longitudinal trends of gender parity in awards and grants within the Neurocritical Care Society (NCS).METHODS: A retrospective analysis was conducted of all available data longitudinally from 2004, when NCS first granted awards through 2019. We used self-identified gender in the membership roster to record gender for each individual. For individuals without recorded gender, we used a previously validated double verification method using a systematic web-based search. We collected data on six awards distributed by the NCS and divided these awards into two main categories: (1) scientific category: (a) Christine Wijman Young Investigator Award; (b) Best Scientific Abstract Award; (c) Fellowship Grant; (d) INCLINE Grant; and (2) non-scientific category: (a) Travel Grant; and (b) Presidential Citation. Available data were analyzed to evaluate longitudinal trends in awards using descriptive statistics and simple or multiple linear regression analyses, as appropriate.
    RESULTS: A total of 445 awards were granted between the years 2004 and 2019. Thirty-six awards were in the scientific category, while 409 awards were in the non-scientific category. Only 8% of women received NCS awards in the scientific awards category, whereas 44% of women received an award in the non-scientific category. Most notable in the scientific category are the Best Scientific Abstract Award and the Fellowship Grant, in which no woman has ever received an award to date, compared to 18 men between both awards. In contrast, women are well represented in the non-scientific awards category with an average of 5% increase per year in the number of women awardees.
    CONCLUSIONS: Our data reveal gender disparity, mainly for scientific or research awards. Prompt evaluation of the cause and further actions to address gender disparity in NCS grants and recognition awards is needed to establish gender equity in this area.
    Keywords:  Disparity in awards; Disparity in grants; Gender discrimination; Gender gap; Gender parity; Neurocritical care; Women in medicine
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s12028-020-01164-2
  27. Front Psychol. 2020 ;11 629951
      The aim of this article is to map the intellectual structure of scholarship on economic and social value in the sport industry. Given that bibliometric techniques are specially appropriate for identifying the intellectual structures of a field of knowledge and complement traditional literature reviews, a co-citation bibliometric analysis has been applied. This kind of analysis identifies networks of interconnections. Therefore, we aim to detect both the most and the least active research areas in this field, as well as their sub-disciplinary composition. There is an abundance of literature on sport efficiency and economic efficiency in the sport industry, our main conclusion is the identification of a literature gap in regard to social value in sport organisations, which is expected to be a research opportunity for scholars. This is in line with the lack of standardisation in the measurement for social value in sport organisations. In fact, similar to analysis undertaken in the past few decades of other industries with contributions to stakeholders and the multi-fiduciary theory of stakeholders, both the creation of social value indicators for sport entities and the empirical analysis of social efficiency in sport institutions, are identified and outlined as future areas of research. Therefore, this bibliometric analysis will contribute to determine the future challenges that this area of research will face in the following years so as to fill the literature gap identified.
    Keywords:  bibliometric; co-citation; economic value; intellectual structure; multi-fiduciary theory of stakeholders; social value; sports; trends
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.629951
  28. Biopreserv Biobank. 2021 Jan 15.
      Background: Cohort studies with biobanks that use strict quality standards are essential requirements, not only for the development of new diagnostic and prognostic markers, but also for improving the understanding of pathophysiology of disease development, which have drawn an increasing amount of attention over the past decades. However, a bibliometric analysis of the global research on cohort biobanks is rare. The objective of this study was to evaluate the origin, current trend, and research hotspots of cohort biobanks. Materials and Methods: We searched the Web of Science Core Collection (WoSCC) with "biobank" and "cohort" as the topic words to retrieve English language articles published from 2009 to 2018. The CiteSpace 5.5.R2 was used to perform the cooperation network analysis, key words co-occurrence and burst detection analysis, and reference co-citation analysis. Results: The number of publications on cohort biobanks has increased over the past decade. Tai Hing Lam from the Department of Community Medicine, University of Hong Kong, was found to be the most productive researcher in this field. The percentage of publications in England (38.30%) was the highest all over the world. Risk, biobank, meta-analysis, cohort, disease, and so on were the most frequent keywords. Metabolic syndrome was the strongest burst keyword in this field, followed by Hong Kong, Guangzhou biobank cohort and personalized medicine. Moreover, of all the references for 932 articles included in the study, the article titled "UK biobank: an open access resource for identifying the causes of a wide range of complex diseases of middle and old age" published in PLoS Med by Sudlow et al., was the most frequently co-cited reference in this field. The largest cluster was labeled as Guangzhou biobank cohort study. Conclusions: This study provides an insight into cohort biobanks and the valuable information for biobankers to identify new perspectives on potential collaborators and cooperative countries/territories.
    Keywords:  bibliometrics; biological specimen banks; burst detection; cohort studies; data visualization
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1089/bio.2020.0096
  29. Brain Sci. 2021 Jan 08. pii: E74. [Epub ahead of print]11(1):
      Parents interventions are relevant to address autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The objective of this study is to analyze the importance and evolution of ASD and its relationship with the parents (ASD-PAR) in the publications indexed in Web of Science. For this, a bibliometric methodology has been used, based on a scientific mapping of the reported documents. We have worked with an analysis unit of 1381 documents. The results show that the beginnings of scientific production date back to 1971. There are two clearly differentiated moments in scientific production. A first moment (1971-2004), where the production volume is low. A second moment (2005-2019), where the volume of production increases considerably. Therefore, it can be said that the subject began to be relevant for the scientific community from 2005 to the present. The keyword match rate between set periods marks a high level of match between periods. It is concluded that the main focus of the research on ASD-PAR is on the stress that is generated in families with children with ASD, in addition to the family problems that the fact that these children also have behavior problems can cause.
    Keywords:  autism; bibliometric analysis; parent-based intervention; scientific mapping; scimat; web of science
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.3390/brainsci11010074
  30. Future Sci OA. 2020 Nov 02. 7(2): FSO651
      
    Keywords:  Altmetric; coronavirus; gender parity; integrated functioning; research
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.2144/fsoa-2020-0175
  31. Altern Ther Health Med. 2021 Jan 08. pii: AT6398. [Epub ahead of print]
      Introduction: Scientific literature lacks a scientometric analysis of traditional, complementary and alternative medicine (TCAM) for dermatology. The aim of this study is to investigate the associations between TCAM and dermatology as seen in academic literature published between 1975 and 2018.Methods: All materials analyzed in this study were collected from 3 major academic databases, namely Web of Science, PubMed and Scopus, and all documents assessed were published between 1975 and 2018. A keyword string of "dermatology" AND ("complementary medicine" OR "alternative medicine" OR "traditional medicine" OR "integrative medicine") was used to search the databases.
    Results: A total of 316 articles were retrieved from Web of Science, 388 from Scopus and 389 from PubMed. Original articles represented 92.208% of all literature found. In addition, the USA had the highest number of publications with 61 documents, followed by the UK, China and Germany, while only three developing countries were represented in the group of most productive countries. Notably, low income countries were not represented in the list of countries with the highest volume of publications. Of all the institutions in the most represented countries, the University of Oxford was found to be the most productive. The most used keywords in the literature were noted to be "dermatology", "alternative medicine", "traditional medicine" and "psoriasis".
    Conclusion: In view of the underrepresentation of low income developing countries in the productive group, it is suggested that researchers from these countries should be supported to produce novel TCAM studies in dermatology.
  32. Andrology. 2021 Jan 11.
      BACKGROUND: Male factor infertility (MFI) is a common medical condition which requires high quality research to guide clinical practice; however, systematic reviews (SRs) and meta-analyses (MAs) often vary in quality, raising concerns regarding the validity of their results. We sought to perform an objective analysis of SRs and MAs in MFI treatment and management and to report on the quality of published literature.METHODS: A comprehensive search in PubMed/MEDLINE and EMBASE was used to identify relevant publications. Primary search terms were male infertility, male sterility, and male subfertility. Two authors independently performed searches, screened citations for eligibility, extracted data for analysis, and graded methodological quality using the validated AMSTAR (A Measurement Tool to Assess Systematic Reviews) instrument, a validated tool used in the critical appraisal of SRs/MAs.
    RESULTS: 27 publications met inclusion criteria and were included in the analysis. Mean AMSTAR score (± SD) among all publications was 7.4 (1.9) out of 11, reflecting "fair to good" quality. Non-pharmacological medical treatment for MFI was the most commonly assessed intervention (n=13, 48.1%). No publications met all AMSTAR criteria. While the number of SRs/MAs has increased over time (p=0.037), the quality of publications has not significantly changed (p=0.72). SRs/MAs of the Cochrane Library had higher AMSTAR score than non-Cochrane SRs/MAs (8.5 vs 6.3, p=0.002).
    CONCLUSIONS: The methodological quality of SRs/MAs should be assessed to ensure high-quality evidence for clinical practice guidelines in MFI treatment and management. This review highlights a need for increased effort to publish high-quality studies in MFI treatment and management.
    Keywords:  male infertility; male subfertility; quality; rigor; systematic reviews
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/andr.12972
  33. J Cheminform. 2019 Nov 21. 11(1): 72
      This bibliometric study aims at providing a comprehensive analysis of the history of density functional theory (DFT) from a perspective of chemistry by using reference publication year spectroscopy (RPYS). 114,138 publications with their 4,412,152 non-distinct cited references are analyzed. The RPYS analysis revealed three different groups of seminal papers which researchers in DFT have drawn from: (i) some long-known experimental studies from the 19th century about physical and chemical phenomena were referenced rather frequently in contemporary DFT publications. (ii) Fundamental quantum-chemical papers from the time period 1900-1950 which predate DFT form another group of seminal papers. (iii) Finally, various very frequently employed DFT approximations, basis sets, and other techniques (e.g., implicit descriptions of solvents) constitute another group of seminal papers. The earliest cited reference we found was published in 1806. The references to papers published in the 19th century mainly served the purpose of referring to long-known physical and chemical phenomena which were used to test if DFT approximations deliver correct results (e.g., Van der Waals interactions). The foundational papers of DFT by Hohenberg and Kohn as well as Kohn and Sham do not seem to be affected by obliteration by incorporation as they appear as pronounced peaks in our RPYS analysis. Since the 1990s, only very few pronounced peaks occur as most years were referenced nearly equally often. Exceptions are 1993 and 1996 due to seminal papers by Axel Becke, John P. Perdew and co-workers, and Georg Kresse and co-workers.
    Keywords:  CRExplorer; DFT; Density functional theory; Historical roots; RPYS; Reference publication year spectroscopy; Seminal papers
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1186/s13321-019-0395-y
  34. Sci Rep. 2021 Jan 11. 11(1): 318
      Networks of collaboration are notoriously complex and the mechanisms underlying their evolution, although of high interest, are still not fully understood. In particular, collaboration networks can be used to model the interactions between scientists and analyze the circumstances that lead to successful research. This task is not trivial and conventional metrics, based on number of publications and number of citations of individual authors, may not be sufficient to provide a deep insight into the factors driving scientific success. However, network analysis techniques based on centrality measures and measures of the structural properties of the network are promising to that effect. In recent years, it has become evident that most successful research works are achieved by teams rather than individual researchers. Therefore, researchers have developed a keen interest in the dynamics of social groups. In this study, we use real world data from a Thai computer technology research center, where researchers collaborate on different projects and team up to produce a range of artifacts. For each artifact, a score that measures quality of research is available and shared between the researchers that contributed to its creation, according to their percentage of contribution. We identify several measures to quantify productivity and quality of work, as well as centrality measures and structural measures. We find that, at individual level, centrality metrics are linked to high productivity and quality of work, suggesting that researchers who cover strategic positions in the network of collaboration are more successful. At the team level, we show that the evolution in time of structural measures are also linked to high productivity and quality of work. This result suggests that variables such as team size, turnover rate, team compactness and team openness are critical factors that must be taken into account for the success of a team. The key findings of this study indicate that the success of a research institute needs to be assessed in the context of not just researcher or team level, but also on how the researchers engage in collaboration as well as on how teams evolve.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-79447-z
  35. Scientometrics. 2021 Jan 03. 1-27
      On December 31st 2019, the World Health Organization China Country Office was informed of cases of pneumonia of unknown etiology detected in Wuhan City. The cause of the syndrome was a new type of coronavirus isolated on January 7th 2020 and named Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome CoronaVirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). SARS-CoV-2 is the cause of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Since January 2020 an ever increasing number of scientific works related to the new pathogen have appeared in literature. Identifying relevant research outcomes at very early stages is challenging. In this work we use COVID-19 as a use-case for investigating: (1) which tools and frameworks are mostly used for early scholarly communication; (2) to what extent altmetrics can be used to identify potential impactful research in tight (i.e. quasi-zero-day) time-windows. A literature review with rigorous eligibility criteria is performed for gathering a sample composed of scientific papers about SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 appeared in literature in the tight time-window ranging from January 15th 2020 to February 24th 2020. This sample is used for building a knowledge graph that represents the knowledge about papers and indicators formally. This knowledge graph feeds a data analysis process which is applied for experimenting with altmetrics as impact indicators. We find moderate correlation among traditional citation count, citations on social media, and mentions on news and blogs. Additionally, correlation coefficients are not inflated by indicators associated with zero values, which are quite common at very early stages after an article has been published. This suggests there is a common intended meaning of the citational acts associated with aforementioned indicators. Then, we define a method, i.e. the Comprehensive Impact Score (CIS), that harmonises different indicators for providing a multi-dimensional impact indicator. CIS shows promising results as a tool for selecting relevant papers even in a tight time-window. Our results foster the development of automated frameworks aimed at helping the scientific community in identifying relevant work even in case of limited literature and observation time.
    Keywords:  Altmetrics; Bibliometric indicators; COVID-19; Research evaluation; SARS-CoV-2; nCoV-2019
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-020-03809-7
  36. Public Health Nutr. 2021 Jan 13. 1-22
      OBJECTIVE: This study sought to describe and compare study type, research design and translation phase of published research in nutrition and dietetic journals in 1998 and 2018.DESIGN: This was a repeat cross-sectional bibliographic analysis of Nutrition and Dietetics research. All eligible studies in the top eight Nutrition and Dietetics indexed journals in 1998 and 2018 were included. Two independent reviewers coded each study for research design (study type and study design) and translation phase (T0-T4) of the research using seminal texts in the field.
    SETTING: Not relevant.
    PARTICIPANTS: Not relevant.
    RESULTS: The number of publications (1998 n=1030, 2018 n=1016) has not changed over time but the research type, design and translation phases have. The proportion of intervention studies in 1998 (43.8%) was significantly higher than 2018 (19.4%). In 2018, more reviews (46.9% vs 15.6% in 1998) and less randomised trials (14.3% vs 37.8% in 1998) were published. In regards to translation phase, there was a higher proportion of T2-T4 research in 2018 (18.3% vs 3.8% in 1998); however, the proportion of T3/T4 research was still low (<3%). Our sensitivity analysis with the four journals that remained the same across the two time periods found no changes in the research type, design and translation phases across time.
    CONCLUSIONS: There was a reduction in intervention and T0 publications, alongside higher publication of clinical study designs over time; however, published T3/T4 research in Nutrition and Dietetics is low. A greater focus on publishing interventions and dissemination and implementation may be needed.
    Keywords:  Bibliometric; Implementation Science; Research Focus; Research Translation; Study Design
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1017/S1368980021000136