Suicide Mortality Rate as a Sustainable Development Goal (SDG): A Bibliometric Analysis

Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation to Treat Neuropathic Pain: A Bibliometric Analysis

Neuropathic pain is caused by a lesion or disease of the somatosensory system and is one of the most incapacitating pain types, representing a significant non-met medical need. Due to the increase in research in the field and since innovative therapeutic strategies are required, namely in intractable neuropathic pain, neurostimulation has been used. Within this approach, transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) that uses a transient magnetic field to produce electrical currents over the cortex emerges as a popular method in the literature. Since this is an area in expansion and due to the putative role of TMS, we performed a bibliometric analysis in Scopus with the primary objective of identifying the scientific production related to the use of TMS to manage neuropathic pain. The research had no restrictions, and the analysis focused on the characteristics of the literature retrieved, scientific collaboration and main research topics from inception to 6 July 2023. A total of 474 articles were collected. A biggest co-occurrence between the terms "neuropathic pain" and "transcranial magnetic stimulation" was obtained. The journal "Clinical Neurophysiology" leads the Top 5 most productive sources. The United States is the most productive country, with 50% of US documents being "review articles", followed by France, with 56% of French documents being "original articles". Lefaucheur, JP and Saitoh, Y are the two most influential authors. The most frequent type of document was "original article". Most of the studies (34%) that identified the neuropathic pain type focused on traumatic neuropathic pain, although a large proportion (38%) did not report the neuropathic pain type. This study allows us to provide a general overview of the field of TMS application for neuropathic pain and is useful for establishing future directions of research in this field.

The association between nation-level social and economic indices and suicide rates: A pilot study

Ever since the pioneering work of Emile Durkheim, it has been known that regional or national suicide rates can be influenced by a variety of social and economic factors. Recent research has found a robust association between two country-level economic indices-gross national product and unemployment rate-and suicide rates, particularly in men. However, the association between other country-level social indices-such as measures of social integration, inequality, environmental preservation and political freedom-and suicide rates has not been studied at the cross-national level. In the current study, national suicide rates for men and women were examined in relation to seven indices measuring subjective wellbeing, sustainable development, type of political regime, economic and gender inequality, and social capital. It was found that the Happy Planet Index, a composite measure of subjective wellbeing and sustainable development, was negatively associated with suicide rates independent of gender, and even after adjusting for possible confounding factors. Economic inequality was associated with suicide in men, and social capital was associated with suicide in women. Moreover, the strength and direction of the associations observed between socioeconomic indices and suicide varied across income groups. These results highlight the need for a closer evaluation of the link between large-scale ("macro") social factors and individual ("micro") psychological factors, as well as the importance of integrating these factors into suicide prevention programmes at the national level.

The Trends and Content of Research Related to the Sustainable Development Goals: A Systemic Review

This study employed a comprehensive systematic review of the literature (SRL) process with the Content Analysis Toolkits for Academic Research (CATAR) for conducting a bibliometric analysis of the 2814 general SDG-related papers and 92 review papers selected from the Web of Science database from 2013 to 2022. The overview analysis found that the US and UK took the lead in publication and citation. The WHO and several universities were identified as the most prominent institutes around the globe. The field distribution of the most cited papers revealed the existence of a “strong sustainability” paradigm and the importance of science and technology. A landscape of 1123 papers was included in eight clusters according to the bibliographic coupling algorithms in the Multi-stage Document Clustering (MSDC) process. These clusters were then categorized into three groups, “synergies and trade-offs”, “networking”, and “systems analysis”, demonstrated in the theme maps. As for the 92 SDG-related review papers, most were shaped based on literature analysis without specified countries. Moreover, SDG 3 was identified as that exclusively studied in most papers. The information presented is expected to help research scholars, public sectors, and practitioners monitor, gather, check, analyze, and use the growing volume of SDG-related academic articles.

Revisiting evidence of primary prevention of suicide among adult populations: A systematic overview

BACKGROUNDS

Primary prevention of suicidal behaviors in the general population is required to interrupt the trend of self-inflicted deaths worldwide. We reviewed the evidence of the efficacy of primary prevention of suicide among the adult population.

METHODS

This is an overview of systematic reviews. We searched PubMed, EMBASE, Scopus, PsycINFO, and Cochrane databases to identify articles on suicide prevention strategies in non-clinical populations. For the purpose of overview, only systematic reviews were eligible. Primary outcomes: The outcomes of the present study were changes in the number of suicide death or suicide behaviors. Two reviewers assessed the methodological quality and the risk of bias of included studies.

RESULTS

From the initial 2,315 records, 32 articles met inclusion criteria. Evidence of reduction of suicide-related outcomes was detected, but of small magnitude. Most multicomponent prevention programs were delivered to specific populations, comprising strategies such as restriction to lethal means, educational programs, and gatekeeper training. Means restriction was the single intervention that showed some evidence of individual efficacy in reducing suicide. There is evidence that poor quality of media reporting is related with increasing suicide and better-quality reports could help suicide prevention. Most of the included SRs were of critically-low methodological quality.

LIMITATIONS

Publication bias, reporting bias, study designs, outcome definition and article overlap across studies are the main concerns.

CONCLUSIONS

Multicomponent programs and means restriction have indicated a reduction of suicide rates, mainly in specific populations. There is insufficient evidence to recommend a widespread implementation of suicide primary prevention in the general population.

Mental health disorders research in the countries of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), 2008-17, and the disease burden: Bibliometric study

The 57 countries of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation are suffering from an increasing burden from mental health disorders. We investigated their research outputs during 2008–17 in the Web of Science in order to compare them with the burden from different mental health disorders and in different countries. The papers were identified with a complex filter based on title words and journals. Their addresses were parsed to give fractional country counts, show international collaboration, and also reveal country concentration on individual disorders and types of research. We found 17,920 papers in the decade, with output quadrupling. Foreign contributions accounted for 15% of addresses; they were from Europe (7%), Canada + USA (5%) and elsewhere (3%). They were much greater for Qatar and Uganda (> 60%), but less than 10% for Iran and Turkey. Schizophrenia and bipolar disorder were over-researched, but suicide and self-harm were seriously neglected, relative to their mental health disorder burdens. Although OIC research has been expanding rapidly, some countries have published little on this subject, perhaps because of stigma. Turkey collaborates relatively little internationally and as a result its papers received few citations. Among the large OIC countries, it has almost the highest relative mental health disorders burden, which is also growing rapidly.

Peripandemic psychiatric emergencies: impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on patients according to diagnostic subgroup

On March 11th, 2020, the outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) was declared a pandemic. Governments took drastic measures in an effort to reduce transmission rates and virus-associated morbidity. This study aims to present the immediate effects of the pandemic on patients presenting in the psychiatric emergency department (PED) of Hannover Medical School. Patients presenting during the same timeframe in 2019 served as a control group. A decrease in PED visits was observed during the COVID-19 pandemic with an increase in repeat visits within 1 month (30.2 vs. 20.4%, p_BA = 0.001). Fewer patients with affective disorders utilized the PED (15.2 vs. 22.2%, p_BA = 0.010). Suicidal ideation was stated more frequently among patients suffering from substance use disorders (47.4 vs. 26.8%, p_BA = 0.004), while patients with schizophrenia more commonly had persecutory delusions (68.7 vs. 43.5%, p_BA = 0.023) and visual hallucinations (18.6 vs. 3.3%, p_BA = 0.011). Presentation rate of patients with neurotic, stress-related, and somatoform disorders increased. These patients were more likely to be male (48.6 vs. 28.9%, p_BA = 0.060) and without previous psychiatric treatment (55.7 vs. 36.8%, p_BA = 0.089). Patients with personality/behavioral disorders were more often inhabitants of psychiatric residencies (43.5 vs. 10.8%, p_BA = 0.008). 20.1% of patients stated an association between psychological well-being and COVID-19. Most often patients suffered from the consequences pertaining to social measures or changes within the medical care system. By understanding how patients react to such a crisis situation, we can consider how to improve care for patients in the future and which measures need to be taken to protect these particularly vulnerable patients.