European and US publications in the 50 highest ranking pathology journals from 2000 to 2006

Relationship between European postgraduate programme accreditation and national research output: The case of the Network of Erasmus-Based European Orthodontic Postgraduate Programmes (NEBEOP) in orthodontics. A bibliometric study

AIMS

To assess in each European country the correlation between the number of Network of Erasmus-Based European Orthodontic Postgraduate Programmes (NEBEOP) members and orthodontic research activity. Secondary objectives were to describe and quantify Europe's orthodontic research.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

Articles published between 2014 and 2018 in 4 major orthodontic journals (American Journal of Orthodontics and Dentofacial Orthopedics, European Journal of Orthodontics, The Angle Orthodontist, Orthodontics and Craniofacial Research) and oral presentation abstracts of five European Orthodontic Society (EOS) congresses were analysed. For each European country, the total number of orthodontic programmes and NEBEOP memberships were collected. Descriptive statistics were performed, and Spearman correlation coefficients and risk ratios were calculated.

RESULTS

2039 articles and 261 oral presentation abstracts were included. Correlation coefficients between national number of publications, oral presentations, sum of these, all adjusted for population, and number of NEBEOP members in each country were 0.64, 0.65 and 0.62, respectively. Risk ratios were all above 1 and statistically significant for number of NEBEOP memberships per country, indicating positive associations with national orthodontic research productivity. Europe accounted for 30.5% of publications and 68.6% of oral presentations at EOS congresses during this period. European orthodontic research was not evenly distributed, since 9 countries were responsible for around 80% of the output.

CONCLUSIONS

A positive association was found between number of NEBEOP programmes and national research activity. These results could be an additional argument to support similar pan-European initiatives and guidelines for postgraduate education, not only in orthodontics but in all other dental specialties.

Impact factor of medical education journals and recently developed indices: Can any of them support academic promotion criteria?

Journal Impact Factor (JIF) has been used in assessing scientific journals. Other indices, h- and g-indices and Article Influence Score (AIS), have been developed to overcome some limitations of JIF. The aims of this study were, first, to critically assess the use of JIF and other parameters related to medical education research, and second, to discuss the capacity of these indices in assessing research productivity as well as their utility in academic promotion. The JIF of 16 medical education journals from 2000 to 2011 was examined together with the research evidence about JIF in assessing research outcomes of medical educators. The findings were discussed in light of the nonnumerical criteria often used in academic promotion. In conclusion, JIF was not designed for assessing individual or group research performance, and it seems unsuitable for such purposes. Although the g- and h-indices have demonstrated promising outcomes, further developments are needed for their use as academic promotion criteria. For top academic positions, additional criteria could include leadership, evidence of international impact, and contributions to the advancement of knowledge with regard to medical education.

25 years of telepathology research: a bibliometric analysis

BACKGROUND

The first appearance of the word "telepathology" in a scientific paper can be tracked down to 1986, in a famous editorial of Ronald Weinstein. Since that paper, research in telepathology grew up developing different subfields, including static and dynamic telepathology and more recently virtual microscopy. The present work attempts an analysis of research in telepathology, starting from the tools provided by bibliometrics.

METHODS

A query has been developed to extract papers related to telepathology and virtual microscopy, and it has been then submitted to Pubmed by means of Entrez Utilities functions. Results obtained in XML have been processed through ad-hoc developed PHP scripts, in order to extract data on Authors, countries, and keywords.

RESULTS

On PubMed, 967 papers related to telepathology and virtual microscopy have been retrieved, which involved 2904 Authors; corresponding authors were from 37 countries. Of those authors, 2213 co-authored just one paper. Papers were published on 344 different journals, of which only 52 from the Pathology field. An analysis of papers per year has been also attempted, that demonstrates variable research output in time.

CONCLUSIONS

From the proposed analysis, telepathology seems to have been consistently studied, in time, by about 400 researchers, with occasional participation of many other people. Telepathology research seems also to have varied in time, although some peaks in paper publishing are certainly related to the proceedings of the European congress on telepathology series, when they have been published on journals. However, some clear sign appears that suggests research in traditional telepathology, after a peak in 2000, showed some decline until virtual microscopy became mainstream, topic that currently pushes research again. The low number of clinical trials calls for more randomized studies in telepathology, to enable evidence-based application.

Dermatologic research in the Nordic countries 1989-2008--a bibliometric study

BACKGROUND

Bibliometric methods, based on the count of articles published in scientific journals, are increasingly used to evaluate scientific productivity. Bibliometric studies may identify factors that promote or inhibit research performance. We set out to analyze dermatologic research activity in Sweden, Denmark, Finland, and Norway using bibliometric methods.

METHODS

We performed repetitive searches on Medline, using the PubMed interface, for the period 1989-2008. Dermatologic articles were defined as all articles in dermatologic journals plus articles in nondermatologic journals in which the address of first author included an institution of dermatology. Articles were allocated to the country of first author's address.

RESULTS

The number of dermatologic articles from Sweden, Denmark, Finland, and Norway was 1896 (214 per million inhabitants), 1502 (281), 1017 (196), and 249 (55), respectively. Dermatologic articles represented 1.4%, 2.3%, 1.6%, and 0.6% of each country's total number of Medline articles in English over the same period. Similar patterns were found in relation to gross domestic product, number of dermatologists, and number of medical schools. After 2000, the yearly number of dermatologic articles from Denmark increased and that from Finland decreased, whereas the numbers from Sweden and Norway remained relatively stable.

CONCLUSIONS

Despite similarities in social and economic conditions in Sweden, Denmark, Finland, and Norway, there are great differences in dermatologic research activity in the four countries, with Denmark performing best and Norway poorest. Historical and cultural factors may partly explain these differences.

Radiological research activity 1998-2007: relationship to gross domestic product, health expenditure and public expenditure on education

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the relationship of the radiological research activity from 1998 to 2007 to the gross domestic product (GDP), health expenditure and public expenditure on education. METHODS: The population-adjusted research activity determined by the number of articles published, the cumulative impact factor (IF) and the cumulative IF per capita were correlated with per capita values of the GDP, health expenditure and public education expenditure. Linear regression analysis and multiple regression analysis were used for statistical analysis. RESULTS: The cumulative IF per capita correlated with the GDP per capita (R = 0.94, P < 0.0001), health expenditure per capita (R = 0.93, P < 0.0001) and public expenditure on education per capita (R = 0.93, P < 0.0001). Multiple regression analysis demonstrated that public expenditure on education was an independent predictor of radiological research activity (P < 0.001), whereas the year, GDP and health expenditure did not reach statistical significance (P > 0.05). CONCLUSION: Radiological research activity demonstrates a close relationship to the GDP, health expenditure and public expenditure on education. The last factor independently predicts research activity.

Pathological research output in China and other top-ranking countries: 10-year survey of the literature

The present study was designed to study the research output in pathology journals from the United States (USA), Japan, Germany, the United Kingdom (UK), France, and China between 2000 and 2009. Articles published in 67 pathology-related journals were retrieved from the PubMed database. US-American publications, which rank first, accounted for 30.9% of the total world's output and for 35.4% in the top 10% journals with impact factor (IF) scores. Chinese publications accounted for 2.8% of a total of 67 journals, and for 2.0% in the top 10% journals with IF scores. Our analysis investigated the research output of these six countries and revealed a positive trend in China for the period 2000-2009. Also, in contrast to other top-ranking countries, our results imply that China's research in the field of pathology falls behind that of the developed countries, and appropriate steps should be taken to improve the role of pathologists in clinical activity and to gear up for high-quality pathological studies.

Analysis of research output parameters: density equalizing mapping and citation trend analysis

BACKGROUND

Burden of disease studies indicate major socio-economic burdens since many years. They should be used for the allocation of funding. However, imbalances are present in funding policies and therefore benchmarking becomes increasingly important in health services research.

METHODS

The present study assessed benchmarking approaches. Using large data base analyses, research was analyzed for different health research output parameters. The fields of cardiovascular and respiratory medicine served as models to assess irregular patterns of health research. For visualization, density equalizing mapping procedures were used.

RESULTS

Specific areas of major research activity were identified for European countries and large differences were found. Spatial distribution of published items for cardiac and cardiovascular systems differed in comparison to the distribution for the respiratory system. In general, large countries dominated the overall number of published items. When qualitative measures such as citation analysis were assessed, differing results were achieved. In this category, mostly Scandinavian countries dominated.

CONCLUSION

The present approach of comparative output benchmarking can be used to assess institutional operating figures at the national and international level and to analyze imbalances in health and research funding.

Institutional operating figures in basic and applied sciences: scientometric analysis of quantitative output benchmarking

Background

Institutional operating figures and benchmarking systems are important features for the implementation of efficacy in basic and applied sciences. They are needed for research evaluation and funding policy. However, the current policy settings for research evaluation urgently need review since there may be imbalances present in many areas.

Methods

The present study assessed benchmarking of research output. By the use of large data bases research output was categorized and analyzed. Specific areas of major research activity were identified by comparing publication density on different organ systems and inter- and intrafield comparison was performed for selected countries.

Results

Novel density-equalizing mappings were constructed that illustrate trends of publication activity and identify subsets of major interest in a total of 5,527,558 published items. A dichotomy was present between Western countries such as the US, UK or Germany and Asian countries such as Japan, China or South Korea concerning research focuses.

Conclusion

The present study is the first large scale analysis of global research activity and output over the last 50 years. The presently described assessment of operating figures at the national and international level can be used to identify single areas of research that are heavily focused. Further research on qualitative output benchmarking is needed to improve current policy settings for research evaluation.

Where we publish : an analysis of the publications of German institutes of pathology

Pathologists provide the link between the clinical and the natural science aspect of medicine and are often integrated in translational research projects. We wanted to analyse the spread and position of research led by pathologists in the scientific literature. Publications from institutes of pathology of 21 randomly chosen German university cities between 2004 and 2006 were analysed. To validate our findings we subsequently extended our analysis to 45 university cities from Italy, France and the Nordic countries (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden). We detected publications directed by pathologists in numerous biomedical journals, most of which not categorised as "pathology" journals. In the analyses from Germany and Italy, Virchows Archiv led the ranking in terms of absolute number of publications. Meanwhile, Anticancer Research and the International Journal of Cancer took the lead concerning publications from pathologists from the Nordic countries. Our results mirror the wide diversification in scientific pathology and the overlap with other medical subspecialties, especially oncology, cell biology and biochemistry. This explains the problem of defining "pathology" journals and deducting pathological research activity from these publications. However, the general notion that pathology journals are the most important communication medium of pathology research was affirmed.