The Arab region's contribution to global COVID-19 research: Bibliometric and visualization analysis

Mapping the landscape of medical research in the Arab world countries: A comprehensive bibliometric analysis

OBJECTIVES

To describe the productivity, performance, and impact of medical research in the Arab world countries.

METHODS

We carried out a bibliometric analysis using Clarivate Analytics databases from January 2017 to March 2023. We reported research productivity, national and international research collaboration patterns, impact of Arab medical research output compared to the global average, top medical journals publishing Arab-affiliated research, and performance of the most productive Arab institutions.

RESULTS

The Arab world contributed 2.72% to global medical research publication, with a citation impact of 11.98 compared to the global impact of 12.02. Qatar, Lebanon, and Saudi Arabia led medical research publications per million population among Arab countries, ranking 26th, 36th, and 37th globally. Medical research publications increased by 87% annually from 2017-2022, with 70% of research originating from Saudi Arabia and Egypt. National collaborations accounted for 15% of Arab world publications, while international collaborations represented 66%. The median impact factor across the top 20 medical journals with Arab-affiliated authors was 5.14, with 50% being quartile one journals. The top 10 Arab-origin medical journals had a median impact factor of 3.13. Approximately 80% of the top 20 Arab institutions were academic, with a median publication count of 3,162.5 and a median citation impact of 14.5.

CONCLUSION

The study provides insights into the state of medical research in the Arab countries, indicating room for improvement in the region's medical research.

Global Mapping and Visualization Analysis of One Health Knowledge in the COVID-19 Context

Globally, the COVID-19 pandemic had a significant impact on the health, social, and economic systems, triggering lasting damage and exposing the complexity of the problem beyond just being a health emergency. This crisis has highlighted the need for a comprehensive and collaborative strategy to successfully counter infectious diseases and other global challenges. With the COVID-19 pandemic pushing One Health to the forefront of global health and sustainable development agendas, this concept has emerged as a potential approach for addressing these challenges. In the context of COVID-19, this study investigates global knowledge about One Health by examining its state, significant contributions, and future directions. It seeks to offer an integrated framework of insights guiding the development of well-informed decisions. A comprehensive search using the Scopus database was conducted, employing specific terms related to One Health and COVID-19. VOSviewer 1.6.19 software was used to generate network visualization maps. Countries' research output was adjusted based on their gross domestic product (GDP) and population size. The study identified a total of 527 publications. The United States led with 134 documents (25.4%), but India topped the adjusted ranking. One Health journal stood as the most common outlet for disseminating knowledge (49 documents; 9.3%), while Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the United States emerged as the most prolific institution (13 documents; 2.5%). Key topics were related to the virus transmission mechanisms, climate change impacts, antimicrobial resistance, ecosystem health, preparedness, collaboration, community engagement, and developing of efficient surveillance systems. The study emphasizes how critical it is to capitalize on the present momentum of COVID-19 to advance One Health concepts. Integrating social and environmental sciences, and a variety of professions for better interaction and collaboration is crucial. Additionally, increased funding for developing countries, and legislative empowerment are vital to advance One Health and boost disease prevention.

Water, sanitation, and hygiene global research: evolution, trends, and knowledge structure

Water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) services play a crucial role in promoting public and environmental health as well as social and economic development. At the global level, particularly in the developing world, WASH issues continue to present significant challenges. These challenges have been further intensified by factors such as the COVID-19 pandemic, escalating conflicts, climate change, water scarcity, and rising inequality. The scientific community has actively engaged in constructive discussions on these issues, as evidenced by the notable research findings. Therefore, the aim of this study was to comprehensively examine and evaluate global knowledge on WASH. To search for relevant publications, the Scopus database was utilized using specific terms associated with WASH. VOSviewer 1.6.18 software was employed to generate network visualization maps, which assessed collaborative patterns and research trends in the field of WASH. The research output of countries was adjusted considering their gross domestic product (GDP) and population size. The total number of WASH-related publications, including all types of documents, was 1805. By narrowing the search to articles and reviews, the overall global productivity yielded 1589 documents: 1367 (86.0%) original articles and 222 (14.0%) review articles. The USA had the highest number of WASH publications (n = 668; 42.0%), followed by the UK (n = 396; 24.9%), Switzerland (n = 151; 9.5%), and Australia (n = 141; 8.9%). Ethiopia emerged as the leading country in terms of GDP per capita and the number of publications, followed by Uganda, Malawi, India, and Bangladesh. The USA, the UK, and Switzerland exhibited the most extensive collaboration among countries. The main research areas encompassed the role of WASH in sustainable development, the impacts of inadequate access to WASH services on gender equality, children, infants, and the outbreak of COVID-19 and other diseases, as well as the significance of hygiene practices and community and school-based WASH interventions in reducing infections. This study provides a novel analysis of global WASH-related research and highlights the distribution of outcomes across nations. Continued and increased collaboration between developed and developing nations will facilitate the sharing of responsibility for WASH research outcomes and the implementation of effective policies.

COVID-19 research in South Asia: a bibliometric analysis of the 100 most-cited articles

Background

With the surge in the number of infected individuals during the COVID-19 pandemic, there was also a surge observed in the number of publications discussing its epidemiology, characteristics, path-o-phys-i-ol-o-gy, diagnosis, prevention and treatment. This bibliometric analysis focuses on the papers published on COVID-19 in South Asia.

Methods

We searched articles in the Scopus database from December 2019 to October, 2022. After manual screening, a list of the 100 most-cited articles was obtained, which was analyzed for various factors, including the type of article, citation count, author's affiliation, country of origin, funding bodies, etc.

Results

The majority of the top 100 articles (n=79) in South Asia were published during 2020. India was affiliated with the highest number of articles (n=68), followed by Bangladesh (n=18) and Pakistan (n=12). However, 7 articles were authored by a researcher in Bangladesh. Female authors were under represented (32.38%), with no female author in lists of authors with 4 or more articles. The average number of citations for each of the top 100 most-cited articles was 180.8. Original articles constituted the major portion of the publications (82%), followed by letters (11%) and reviews (4%). Half of the publications belonged to the field of medicine (n=49), while others were contributed by science, psychology, social sciences, and biochemistry and allied sciences (n=8). Vaccine trials were under-represented. Jahangirnagar University, Bangladesh was affiliated with the maximum number of articles. Most articles were published in Science of The Total Environment (n=8) while Indian Council of Medical Research (n=4) was the top funding body.

Conclusion

These findings highlight that South Asia has a great potential to conduct research addressing its challenging health problems. But lack of funds hinders conducting trials of new medications and vaccines. Thus, there is need for allocation of sufficient funds for research and clinical trials by governments and the private sector to enhance the research productivity of this region.

Global research trends and mapping knowledge structure of depression in dialysis patients

BACKGROUND

Depression is one of the most common and important psychological issues faced by dialysis patients. It can make it more difficult for them to adhere to their treatment regimen, which, in turn, can worsen their physical symptoms and lead to poorer health outcomes.

AIM

To examine the evolution and growth of publications related to dialysis and depression. The objectives were to identify the number of publications, the top active countries, the contributed institutions, funding agencies and journals, as well as to perform citation and research theme analysis.

METHODS

The search was conducted using the Scopus database for publications related to dialysis and depression between 1970 and 2022. Subsequently, bibliometric analysis was carried out on the data obtained using VOSviewer software, version 1.6.9. This analysis included visualization analysis, co-occurrence analysis and examination of publication trends in dialysis and depression.

RESULTS

We identified 800 publications that met the search criteria. The number of publications related to dialysis and depression has increased significantly in the past two decades. The USA led the way with 144 publications, which is 18% of all publications on this topic. Turkey came second with 88 publications (11%), followed by China with 55 publications (6.88%) and Iran with 52 publications (6.5%). Analysis of the research theme identified three main clusters related to gender differences in prevalence, identification of depression as a risk factor, and effective interventions to relieve depression. Future research direction analysis shows a shift toward effective interventions to relieve depression in dialysis patients.

CONCLUSION

This study provides a comprehensive overview of growth, trends and research themes related to dialysis and depression that could help researchers identify gaps in the literature and develop future research.

Olfactory and Gustatory Dysfunction in COVID-19: A Global Bibliometric and Visualized Analysis

OBJECTIVES

Coronavirus illness (COVID-19) has been found to alter infected people's sense of smell and taste. However, the pathobiology of this virus is not yet known. Therefore, it is critical to investigate the influence of COVID-19 infection on olfactory and gustatory processes. Therefore, we use bibliometric analysis on COVID-19 and olfactory and/or gustatory dysfunction publications to provide studies perspective.

METHODS

A bibliometric literature search was performed in the Scopus database. The number and type of publications, countries for publications, institutional sources for publications, journals for publications, citation patterns, and funding agencies were analyzed using Microsoft Excel or VOSviewer. In addition, the VOSviewer 1.6.17 software was used to analyze and visualize hotspots and collaboration patterns between countries.

RESULTS

Scopus has published 187 088 documents for COVID-19 in all study fields at the time of data collection (July 26, 2021). A total of 1740 documents related to olfactory and/or gustatory dysfunction were recovered. The countries most relevant by the number of publications were the United States (n = 362, 20.80%), Italy (n = 255, 14.66%), and the United Kingdom (n = 173, 9.94%). By analyzing the terms in the titles and abstracts, we identified 2 clusters related to olfactory and/or gustatory dysfunction research, which are "diagnosis and test methods" and "prognosis and complications of the disease."

CONCLUSIONS

This is the first bibliometric analysis of publications related to COVID-19 and olfactory and/or gustatory dysfunction. This study provides academics and researchers with useful information on the publishing patterns of the most influential publications on COVID-19 and olfactory and/or gustatory dysfunction. Olfactory and/or gustatory dysfunction as indices of suspicion for the empirical diagnosis of coronavirus infection is a new hotspot in this field.

The State of Cancer Care in the United Arab Emirates in 2022

Cancer is the third-leading cause of death in the United Arab Emirates (UAE); cancer care in the UAE has evolved dramatically over the last 40 years, from a single center in Al Ain in 1981 to more than 30 cancer centers and clinics across the UAE, with at least four comprehensive cancer centers in the UAE nowadays. Despite the significant progress in medical care, cancer quality control across the UAE is still lacking, with significant variations in cancer care across the cancer centers. Access to clinical trials is still hampered by a lack of expertise and research infrastructure and a small population, which renders patient accrual for trials a major challenge. Education and training are other areas for improvement that require immediate attention, and, in this review, we try to address these critical aspects for stakeholders to consider better cancer care in the UAE. Early cancer detection and screening are still evolving in the UAE, and a national screening program is lacking. There is also a need to address barriers to screening and to consider less invasive screening methods such as approved blood-based screening, which is likely to be more acceptable to the UAE population. In this review, we also address new topics that have not been addressed previously, including oncology medical tourism, psycho-oncology, onco-fertility, precision oncology, survivorship, oncology nursing, cancer support programs, and the oncology sector's response to the COVID-19 pandemic, all in the context of the UAE cancer landscape. Finally, we provide recommendations for policymakers, regulators, payers, patient advocacy groups, and the UAE oncology community regarding the delivery and future planning of high-quality cancer care. These recommendations are aligned with the UAE government's vision to reduce cancer mortality and provide high-quality healthcare for its citizens and residents.

Bibliometric and Visualization Analysis of the Ecology of Men's Sexual and Reproductive Healthcare Research in MENA (1985-2022): Outputs, Trends, Shortcomings and Hotspots

Background

To date, no previous research assessed the bibliometrics of men's sexual and reproductive healthcare (SRHC) across Arab countries. This study appraised the current standing of men's SRHC research in the MENA (Middle East and North Africa) region.

Methods

We performed a bibliometric analysis to assess qualitatively and quantitatively the peer-reviewed articles published from Arab countries from inception to 2022. In addition, we conducted a visualization analysis, and assessed outputs, trends, shortcomings and hotspots over the given time period.

Results

There was a generally low numbers of publications, 98 studies were identified, all with cross-sectional design, and two thirds explored prevention and control of HIV/other STDs. Studies were published in 71 journals, of which the Eastern Mediterranean Health Journal, Journal of Egyptian Public Health Association, AIDS Care and BMC public health were most common. The Journal of Adolescent Health, Fertility Sterility and Journal of Cancer Survivorship were among the highest IF ranking. Publishers were commonly USA or UK-based, median journal IF was 2.09, and five articles were in journals of IF > 4. Saudi Arabia had the highest published output followed by Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon, while 10 Arab countries had no publications on the topic. Corresponding authors expertise fields were most commonly public health, infectious diseases and family medicine). Collaborations in-between MENA countries were notably low.

Conclusions

There is general paucity of published outputs on SRHC. More research across MENA is needed, with more inter-MENA collaborations, and with inclusion of countries that currently have no outputs on SRHC. In order to accomplish such goals, R&D funding and capacity building are required. Research and published outputs should address SRHC burdens.

Current global research landscape on COVID-19 and cancer: Bibliometric and visualization analysis

BACKGROUND

Cancer is a severe public health issue that seriously jeopardizes global health. In individuals with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), cancer is considered an independent risk factor for severe illness and increased mortality.

AIM

To identify research hotspots and prospects, we used bibliometrics to examine the global production of COVID-19 literature published in the field of oncology.

METHODS

Data on publication output were identified based on the Scopus database between January 1, 2020, and June 21, 2022. This study used VOSviewer to analyze collaboration networks among countries and assess the terms most often used in the titles and abstracts of retrieved publications to determine research hotspots linked to cancer and COVID-19. The Impact Index Per Article for the top 10 high-cited papers collected from Reference Citation Analysis (RCA) are presented.

RESULTS

A total of 7015 publications were retrieved from the database. The United States published the greatest number of articles (2025; 28.87%), followed by Italy (964; 13.74%), the United Kingdom (839; 11.96%), and China (538; 7.67%). The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center (n = 205, 2.92%) ranked first, followed by the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (n = 176, 2.51%). The European Journal of Cancer (n = 106, 1.51%) ranked first, followed by the Frontiers in Oncology (n = 104, 1.48%), Cancers (n = 102, 1.45%), and Pediatric Blood and Cancer (n = 95; 1.35%). The hot topics were stratified into "cancer care management during the COVID-19 pandemic"; and "COVID-19 vaccines in cancer patients".

CONCLUSION

This is the first bibliometric analysis to determine the present state and upcoming hot themes related to cancer and COVID-19 and vice versa using VOSviewer during the early stages of the pandemic. The emergence of hot themes related to cancer and COVID-19 may aid researchers in identifying new research areas in this field.

SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19 Research Trend during the First Two Years of the Pandemic in the United Arab Emirates: A PRISMA-Compliant Bibliometric Analysis

Scientific research is an integral part of fighting the COVID-19 pandemic. This bibliometric analysis describes the COVID-19 research productivity of the United Arab Emirates (UAE)-affiliated researchers during the first two years of the pandemic, 2020 to 2022. The Web of Science Core Collection (WoSCC) database was utilized to retrieve publications related to COVID-19 published by UAE-affiliated researcher(s). A total of 1008 publications met the inclusion criteria and were included in this bibliometric analysis. The most studied broad topics were general internal medicine (11.9%), public environmental occupational health (7.8%), pharmacology/pharmacy (6.3%), multidisciplinary sciences (5%), and infectious diseases (3.4%). About 67% were primary research articles, 16% were reviews, and the remaining were editorials letters (11.5%), meeting abstracts/proceedings papers (5%), and document corrections (0.4%). The University of Sharjah was the leading UAE-affiliated organization achieving 26.3% of the publications and funding 1.8% of the total 1008 published research. This study features the research trends in COVID-19 research affiliated with the UAE and shows the future directions. There was an observable nationally and international collaboration of the UAE-affiliated authors, particularly with researchers from the USA and England. This study highlights the need for in-depth systematic reviews addressing the specific COVID-19 research-related questions and studied populations.

Mapping the landscape and structure of global research on nutrition and COVID-19: visualization analysis

BACKGROUND

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has had a significant influence on nutritional status. There have been several studies on dietary habits and nutritional status in connection with COVID-19. However, there has been no research on the bibliometric analysis of these papers. Therefore, our objective was to assess the most relevant scientific research on nutrition and COVID-19, as well as to assess current hot themes.

METHODS

We obtained data from the Scopus database on June 30, 2021. Qualitative and quantitative analyzes were conducted based on the Scopus. Collaboration and term analysis was performed using VOSviewer software version 1.6.16.

RESULTS

At the time of data collection, there were 177,946 documents in COVID-19. Scopus found 1885 articles related to nutrition and COVID-19 after narrowing the search to those terms. This includes 1309 (69.44%) research articles, 268 (14.22%) review papers, and 308 other types of document. The USA was the largest producer, with 24.83% of the documents, followed by Italy with 11.88% (n = 224), the UK with 10.82% (n = 204), and China with 7.59% (n = 143). The most active institution was Sapienza Università di Roma (n = 30, 1.59%). The leading journal in COVID-19 nutrition research was Nutrients (n = 115, 6.10%). The article with 310 citations published by Di Renzo et al. in 2020 was the most influential reference. The hot topics were stratified into three clusters: (1) "Food security in the COVID-19 pandemic"; (2) "nutritional determinants and COVID-19 outcomes"; and (3) "changes in dietary habits during the COVID-19 pandemic and its consequences".

CONCLUSIONS

This is the first bibliometric research to offer comprehensive information on COVID-19 and nutrition in the published literature. Research will likely be helpful to scholars and policymakers. This study sheds light on the growth and development of nutrition and covid-19-related research and should contribute to the expansion of the global frontier in the major hot topics, including "food security in the COVID-19 pandemic"; "nutritional determinants and COVID-19 outcomes"; and "changes in diet habits during the COVID-19 pandemic and its consequences".

Contribution of Saudi Arabia to Regional and Global Publications on COVID-19–Related Research: A Bibliometric and Visualization Analysis

Background

At the global level and in Saudi Arabia, COVID-19 remains a major public health problem. The COVID-19 pandemic contributed substantially to a surge in publications on the novel coronavirus responsible for this pandemic. This research is intended to assess the increasing contribution of Saudi Arabia to the global research on COVID-19.

Methods

A bibliometric analysis of all Saudi-affiliated publications on COVID-19 documented between December 2019 and October 2021 was conducted in October 2021 using the Web of Science advanced search builder.

Results

A total of 175,615 global publications on COVID-19 were retrieved in the search. Among these, 9118 (5.2%) publications were from Arab nations. Among the Arab nations, Saudi Arabia (n = 3615) had the highest number of COVID-19 publications, followed by Egypt (n = 2053) and the United Arab Emirates (n = 1057), respectively. Globally, Saudi Arabia ranked 15th among the countries with the highest publication productivity, and the rank was 11th after standardization based on the population size and the gross domestic product. International collaborations were mainly with the researchers from Egypt, followed by the United States, India, Pakistan, and the United Kingdom. King Saud University was the most productive among all institutes in terms of COVID-19-related publications at both local and regional levels.

Conclusion

Saudi Arabia is the leading Arabian nation and one of the top fifteen nations worldwide in terms of COVID-19 research output. Further efforts are warranted from the researchers based in Saudi Arabia in the direction of increasing the quality and the number of publications at the global level. This can be achieved by timely response, proper planning, understating the global research progress, and enhancing the knowledge exchange and collaboration with the other local and international institutes.

Published Research on COVID-19 in the Eastern Mediterranean Region: Bibliometric Analysis (Preprint)

Background

The challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic have led to unprecedented global research activity. The Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR) continues to contribute to COVID-19 research driven by the unique challenges of the region, including the protracted conflicts, already stressed health systems, and serious health and social inequalities.

Objective

This study aims to provide an overview of the publication activities and trends in COVID-19 research in the EMR from the onset of the disease to early 2022 using bibliometric methods.

Methods

A literature search using Scopus was conducted from December 1, 2019, to January 31, 2022, using keywords relevant to COVID-19 and the World Health Organization (WHO) EMR country list. Data were exported and analyzed using Microsoft Excel and the Citation Overview function on Scopus. The quality of journals was determined using SCImago Journal Rank and CiteScore. VOSviewer software was used to visualize the relationships between authors, countries, and key terms used in the retrieved documents.

Results

A total of 6880 documents were retrieved, of which 1805 (26.24%) were from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and 1782 (25.90%) from Iran, followed by Pakistan, Egypt, and Jordan. Most published documents were affiliated with EMR universities, primarily the Tehran University of Medical Sciences in Iran and King Saud University in KSA (396/6880, 5.76%, and 370/6880, 5.4%, respectively), while only 407 (5.92%) of 6880 documents were associated with universities outside the EMR. For most of the identified publications (5020/6880, 72.97%), no funding source was reported, while King Saud University contributed the largest share (282/1860, 15.16%) of funded publications. Retrieved documents were cited 53,516 times, with an average of 7.78 (SD 34.30). Iran was the EMR country with the most links to other countries (77 links and total link strength of 1279). The 5 authors with the most publications were from KSA, Qatar, and Jordan. There were 290 high-frequency keywords that occurred ≥10 times and were linked in 7 different clusters. The cluster with the most linked keywords was related to epidemiology and mortality. Recent topics included vaccines, vaccination, machine learning, and online learning.

Conclusions

This is the first study to show trends in and project future developments of COVID-19 research activity in the EMR. Authors and institutions who led research on COVID-19 in the region were from Iran and KSA. There were multiple regional collaborative efforts; however, international collaboration was limited. Recently, interest has been shifting toward topics related to vaccination, machine learning, and online learning. Understanding the current state of research is instrumental to future research production, and our study will inform regional research initiatives on emerging concepts, as well as opportunities for collaboration and funding.

Global research trends on the links between the gut microbiome and cancer: a visualization analysis

BACKGROUND

Significant links between the microbiota and human health have emerged in the last 20 years. A correlation has recently been demonstrated between changes in the gut microbiota and the development of cancer. This study aimed to use bibliometric analysis of the published gut microbiome and cancer literature to present the research status and summarize the hotspots for frontier studies.

METHODS

A literature search for research on the gut microbiome and cancer research from 2001 to 2020 was conducted using the Scopus database on 20 March 2021. VOSviewer software (version 1.6.16) was used to perform the visualization analysis.

RESULTS

From 2001 to 2020, a total of 2061 publications were retrieved. Annual publication output grew from 10 in 2001 to 486 in 2020. The USA had the largest number of publications, making the largest contribution to the field (n  = 566, 27.46%). Before 2016, most studies focused on the 'effect of probiotics on cancer'. The latest trends showed that 'microbiota composition and gene expression' and 'host-microbiome interaction in cancer immunotherapy' would be more concerned more widely in the future.

CONCLUSIONS

Research on 'microbiota composition and gene expression' and 'host-microbiome interaction in cancer immunotherapy' will continue to be the hotspot. Therefore, this study provides the trend and characteristics of the literature on the gut microbiota and cancer literature, which provided a useful bibliometric analysis for researchers to conduct further research.

Clinical and laboratory characteristics of patients hospitalised with COVID-19: clinical outcomes in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates

BACKGROUND

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) was first reported in December 2019. The severity of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) ranges from asymptomatic to severe and potentially fatal. We aimed to describe the clinical and laboratory features and outcomes of hospitalised patients with COVID-19 within the Abu Dhabi Healthcare Services Facilities (SEHA).

METHODS

Our retrospective analysis of patient data collected from electronic health records (EHRs) available from the SEHA health information system included all patients admitted from 1 March to 31 May 2020 with a laboratory-confirmed PCR diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 infection. Data of clinical features, co-morbidities, laboratory markers, length of hospital stay, treatment received and mortality were analysed according to severe versus non-severe disease.

RESULTS

The study included 9390 patients. Patients were divided into severe and non-severe groups. Seven hundred twenty-one (7.68%) patients required intensive care, whereas the remaining patients (92.32%) had mild or moderate disease. The mean patient age of our cohort (41.8 years) was lower than the global average. Our population had male predominance, and it included various nationalities. The major co-morbidities were hypertension, diabetes mellitus and chronic kidney disease. Laboratory tests revealed significant differences in lactate dehydrogenase, ferritin, C-reactive protein, interleukin-6 and creatinine levels and the neutrophil count between the severe and non-severe groups. The most common anti-viral therapy was the combination of Hydroxychloroquine and Favipiravir. The overall in-hospital mortality rate was 1.63%, although the rate was 19.56% in the severe group. The mortality rate was higher in adults younger than 30 years than in those older than 60 years (2.3% vs. 0.95%).

CONCLUSIONS

Our analysis suggested that Abu Dhabi had lower COVID-19 morbidity and mortalities rates were less than the reported rates then in China, Italy and the US. The affected population was relatively young, and it had an international representation. Globally, Abu Dhabi had one of the highest testing rates in relation to the population volume. We believe the early identification of patients and their younger age resulted in more favourable outcomes.

Scientific Research in Ecuador: A Bibliometric Analysis

Ecuador has shown a growth in its scientific production since 2011, representing 85% of the total historical production. These investigations are reflected in scientific publications, which address world interest topics and serve as a link for the university, business, and society. This work aims to analyze the scientific production generated by Ecuador in the period of 1920–2020 using bibliometric methods to evaluate its intellectual structure and performance. The methodology applied in this study includes: (i) terms definition and search criteria; (ii) database selection, initial search, and document compilation; (iii) data extraction and software selection; and finally, (iv) analysis of results. The results show that scientific production has been consolidated in 30,205 documents, developed in 27 subject areas, in 13 languages under the contribution of 84 countries. This intellectual structure is in harmony with the global context when presenting research topics related to “Biology and regional climate change”, “Higher education and its various approaches”, “Technology and Computer Science”, “Medicine”, “Energy, food and water”, and ”Development and applications on the Web”. Topics framed in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), sustainability, climate change, and others. This study contributes to the academic community, considering current re-search issues and global concerns, the collaboration between universities and countries that allow establishing future collaboration links.

A Review of the Scientific Contributions of Nepal on COVID-19

Purpose of Review

There has been a high influx of publications on the SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19 worldwide in the recent few months as very little was known about them. Nepal too had a substantial number of publications on the same, and there was a need to track the most relevant and impactful to the scientific community through bibliometric analysis.

Recent Findings

A total of 72 publications were analyzed. Bagmati Pradesh (88%) and its district, Kathmandu (77%), was with the most publications. There were no publications from Gandaki and Karnali Province. Most of the publications were in the international medical journals (82%), 53% chose European journals to publish, and 15.27% were related to and published in psychology journals. The majority were original articles (39%) and mostly related to public health (20.83%). 59.7% of the papers had Nepalese as the first author. Most of them were affiliated with Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital and Patan Academy of Health Sciences.

Summary

Our analysis suggests a need to shift the type of studies from observational studies to studies oriented more towards the therapeutic and clinical trials of available medicines and patient care management. Similarly, the bibliometric analysis gives an overall picture of Nepali medical research’s publication status around the globe.

Bibliometric Analysis of Pfizer-BioNTech (BNT162B2): A COVID-19 Vaccine

The objective of the study was to perform a bibliometric analysis of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. For this purpose Scopus database was used. As of 13th May 2021, one hundred and seventy-three (n=173) research documents are published about it. We used Vosviewer and Biblioshiny (Bibliometrix) in the present report. In all publications, 1160 authors have significantly contributed. The documents per author was 0.119, while authors per document was 8.41. Collaborative Index (CI) was found to be 9.47. By biblioshiny we also applied Lotka’s law to depict the author’s frequency. 1097 authors were involved in only one (n=1) publication. Based on the Scopus record, the highest documents are published by Dormitzer, P.R. (n=6). In universities and countries categories, Tel Aviv University (n=7) and USA (48) are the most productive. By Vosviewer the collaboration pattern among authors, institutes, and countries is graphically presented. For example, 28 authors, 17 departments and 7 countries directly contributed to one publication. The research documents (133) are published in 102 sources or journals. The highest documents are published in Vaccines (n=8), while the highest citations were recorded for the New England Journal of Medicine (n=838). We also applied co-words analysis to understand the main focus of these publications.

How Has Covid-19 Affected Published Academic Research? A Content Analysis of Journal Articles Mentioning the Virus

Purpose

Methods to tackle Covid-19 have been developed by a wave of biomedical research but the pandemic has also influenced many aspects of society, generating a need for research into its consequences, and potentially changing the way existing topics are investigated. This article investigates the nature of this influence on the wider academic research mission.

Design/methodology/approach

This article reports an inductive content analysis of 500 randomly selected journal articles mentioning Covid-19, as recorded by the Dimensions scholarly database on 19 March 2021. Covid-19 mentions were coded for the influence of the disease on the research.

Findings

Whilst two thirds of these articles were about biomedicine (e.g. treatments, vaccines, virology), or health services in response to Covid-19, others covered the pandemic economy, society, safety, or education. In addition, some articles were not about the pandemic but stated that Covid-19 had increased or decreased the value of the reported research or changed the context in which it was conducted.

Research limitations

The findings relate only to Covid-19 influences declared in published journal articles.

Practical implications

Research managers and funders should consider whether their current procedures are effective in supporting researchers to address the evolving demands of pandemic societies, particularly in terms of timeliness.

Originality/value

The results show that although health research dominates the academic response to Covid-19, it is more widely disrupting academic research with new demands and challenges.

COVID-19 Pandemic Related Research in Africa: Bibliometric Analysis of Scholarly Output, Collaborations and Scientific Leadership

Scientometrics enables scholars to assess and visualize emerging research trends and hot-spots in the scientific literature from a quantitative standpoint. In the last decades, Africa has nearly doubled its absolute count of scholarly output, even though its share in global knowledge production has dramatically decreased. The still-ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has profoundly impacted the way scholarly research is conducted, published, and disseminated. However, the COVID-19-related research focus, the scientific productivity, and the research collaborative network of African researchers during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic remain to be elucidated. This study aimed to clarify the COVID-19 research patterns among African researchers and estimate the strength of collaborations and partnerships between African researchers and scholars from the rest of the world during the COVID-19 pandemic, collecting data from electronic scholarly databases such as Web of Science (WoS), PubMed/MEDLINE and African Journals OnLine (AJOL), the largest and prominent platform of African-published scholarly journals. We found that COVID-19-related collaboration patterns varied among African regions. For instance, most of the scholarly partnerships occurred with formerly colonial countries (such as European or North-American countries). In other cases, scholarly ties of North African countries were above all with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. In terms of number of publications, South Africa and Egypt were among the most productive countries. Bibliometrics and, in particular, scientometrics can help scholars identify research areas of particular interest, as well as emerging topics, such as the COVID-19 pandemic. With a specific focus on the still-ongoing viral outbreak, they can assist decision- and policy-makers in allocating funding and economic-financial, logistic, organizational, and human resources, based on the specific gaps and needs of a given country or research area.