scholarly journals Do funding applications where peer reviewers disagree have higher citations? A cross-sectional study

F1000Research ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 1030
Author(s):  
Adrian G Barnett ◽  
Scott R. Glisson ◽  
Stephen Gallo

Background: Decisions about which applications to fund are generally based on the mean scores of a panel of peer reviewers. As well as the mean, a large disagreement between peer reviewers may also be worth considering, as it may indicate a high-risk application with a high return. Methods: We examined the peer reviewers' scores for 227 funded applications submitted to the American Institute of Biological Sciences between 1999 and 2006. We examined the mean score and two measures of reviewer disagreement: the standard deviation and range. The outcome variable was the relative citation ratio, which is the number of citations from all publications associated with the application, standardised by field and publication year. Results: There was a clear increase in relative citations for applications with a higher mean. There was no association between relative citations and either of the two measures of disagreement. Conclusions: We found no evidence that reviewer disagreement was able to identify applications with a higher than average return. However, this is the first study to empirically examine this association, and it would be useful to examine whether reviewer disagreement is associated with research impact in other funding schemes and in larger sample sizes.

F1000Research ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 1030
Author(s):  
Adrian G Barnett ◽  
Scott R. Glisson ◽  
Stephen Gallo

Background: Decisions about which applications to fund are generally based on the mean scores of a panel of peer reviewers. As well as the mean, a large disagreement between peer reviewers may also be worth considering, as it may indicate a high-risk application with a high return. Methods: We examined the peer reviewers' scores for 227 funded applications submitted to the American Institute of Biological Sciences between 1999 and 2006. We examined the mean score and two measures of reviewer disagreement: the standard deviation and range. The outcome variable was the relative citation ratio, which is the number of citations from all publications associated with the application, standardised by field and publication year. Results: There was a clear increase in relative citations for applications with a better mean. There was no association between relative citations and either of the two measures of disagreement. Conclusions: We found no evidence that reviewer disagreement was able to identify applications with a higher than average return. However, this is the first study to empirically examine this association, and it would be useful to examine whether reviewer disagreement is associated with research impact in other funding schemes and in larger sample sizes.


2021 ◽  
pp. 014556132110421
Author(s):  
Nilan G. Vaghjiani ◽  
Vatsal Lal ◽  
Nima Vahidi ◽  
Ali Ebadi ◽  
Matthew Carli ◽  
...  

Objective: Determine whether social media platforms can influence article impact as measured by citations. Methods: Cross-sectional study that analyzed articles published in the top 10 otolaryngology journals by Eigenfactor score in January 2015. Total accumulated Twitter mentions and citations were recorded in 2021. The main outcomes examined the difference in citations, tweets, article types, and author counts accumulated over a 5-year period for all articles that were either tweeted or nontweeted. Results: A total of 3094 articles were included for analysis. The average article was cited 11.2 ± 13.2 times and tweeted 2.10 ± 4.0 times. Sixty-four percent of the articles had at least one tweet. Over the study period, there was a statistically significant difference in mean number of citations between tweeted articles (12.1 ± 15.0) versus nontweeted articles (9.6 ± 10.5) citations, representing a 26% difference ( P < .001). Review articles had the highest mean citations (19.4 ± 23.4) while editorials had the lowest mean citations (2.8 ± 6.9). Tweets peaked in the year of publication, but citations continued to rise in the subsequent years. Tweeted articles’ peak citation rate change was +1.27 mean citations per year, compared to +0.99 mean citations per year in nontweeted articles. The mean author count in tweeted articles (5.40 ± 3.1) was not significantly different than the mean author count in nontweeted articles (5.19 ± 2.65, P = .0794). Conclusion: These data suggest a moderate correlation between tweets and article citations, but a clear difference in the number of citations in articles tweeted versus those with no tweets. Thus, dissemination of knowledge may be impacted by social medial platforms such as Twitter.


2018 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 206-211 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kamran Movassagi ◽  
Kyle N. Kunze ◽  
Edward C. Beck ◽  
Michael C. Fu ◽  
Shane J. Nho

Background: The citation rate of a research published article is an indicator of its quality and impact and contributes to the journal’s impact factor. Within the orthopaedic sports medicine literature, predictors of citation rates have not been previously described. Purpose: To identify characteristics of published articles that predict 5-year citation rates of studies in the orthopaedic sports medicine literature. Study Design: Cross-sectional study. Methods: Research articles published in The American Journal of Sports Medicine (AJSM), Arthroscopy: The Journal of Arthroscopic and Related Surgery, and Knee Surgery, Sports Traumatology, Arthroscopy (KSSTA) from 2012 were analyzed. Extracted characteristics of published articles included journal, author number, origin of study, first author degree, subject of study, study type, sample size, number of references and institutions, conflicts of interest, level of evidence, and 5-year citation rates. Multivariate logistic regression was used to determine predictors of greater than the mean number of citations at 5 years. Results: A total of 825 published articles ( AJSM, n = 313; Arthroscopy, n = 173; KSSTA, n = 339) were included in the final analysis. The mean number of 5-year citations was 23.2 (95% CI, 21.6-24.9; range, 1.0-260.0). AJSM had a significantly greater citation rate (32.4) than Arthroscopy (21.7) and KSSTA (15.2) ( P < .001 for both). Arthroscopy had a greater citation rate than KSSTA ( P = .008). Independent predictors of greater than the mean number of citations at 5 years were published articles in AJSM (odds ratio [OR], 5.17; 95% CI, 2.81-9.52; P < .0001), published articles of North American origin (OR, 1.79; 95% CI, 1.25-2.58; P = .002), and published articles regarding the hip (OR, 2.68; 95% CI, 1.08-6.67; P = .035). Conclusion: Published articles in AJSM, those from North America, and those examining the hip were independent predictors of greater citation rates at 5 years.


BMJ Open ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 7 (9) ◽  
pp. e017462 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anthony Chauvin ◽  
David Moher ◽  
Doug Altman ◽  
David L Schriger ◽  
Sabina Alam ◽  
...  

IntroductionSystematic reviews evaluating the impact of interventions to improve the quality of peer review for biomedical publications highlighted that interventions were limited and have little impact. This study aims to compare the accuracy of early career peer reviewers who use an innovative online tool to the usual peer reviewer process in evaluating the completeness of reporting and switched primary outcomes in completed reports.Methods and analysisThis is a cross-sectional study of individual two-arm parallel-group randomised controlled trials (RCTs) published in the BioMed Central series medical journals,BMJ,BMJ OpenandAnnals of Emergency Medicineand indexed with the publication type ‘Randomised Controlled Trial’. First, we will develop an online tool and training module based (a) on the Consolidated Standards of Reporting Trials (CONSORT) 2010 checklist and the Explanation and Elaboration document that would be dedicated to junior peer reviewers for assessing the completeness of reporting of key items and (b) the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine Outcome Monitoring Project process used to identify switched outcomes in completed reports of the primary results of RCTs when initially submitted. Then, we will compare the performance of early career peer reviewers who use the online tool to the usual peer review process in identifying inadequate reporting and switched outcomes in completed reports of RCTs at initial journal submission. The primary outcome will be the mean number of items accurately classified per manuscript. The secondary outcomes will be the mean number of items accurately classified per manuscript for the CONSORT items and the sensitivity, specificity and likelihood ratio to detect the item as adequately reported and to identify a switch in outcomes. We aim to include 120 RCTs and 120 early career peer reviewers.Ethics and disseminationThe research protocol was approved by the ethics committee of the INSERM Institutional Review Board (21 January 2016). The study is based on voluntary participation and informed written consent.Trial registration numberNCT03119376.


Author(s):  
Qaiser Javed Iqbal ◽  
Ayesha Javed ◽  
Zafar Ali Marri ◽  
Nadia Sabeen

Pre-eclampsia is the disorder of extensive vascular endothelial malfunctioning and vasospasm. Both pregnant females and her fetus can develop different complications in the presence of preeclampsia. So we conducted this descriptive cross-sectional study to find the frequency of fetal and maternal outcomes in females having pre-eclampsia. After meeting the inclusion criteria 200 females were enrolled. Patients were followed from 32 weeks of gestation till the end of pregnancy. Inclusion and exclusion criteria were strictly followed. The outcome variable was recorded as per operational definitions. All patients were efficiently managed as per standard protocols. All the data was entered and then analyzed in SPSS v. 22. In this study the mean age of the patients was 28.93 ± 6.75 years, the mean BMI of the females was 27.46 ± 1.48 kg/m2. Partial HELLP syndrome noted in 51 (25.5%) females, maternal mortality occurred in 17 (8.5%) females, while eclampsia, prematurity, perinatal mortality and low birth weight were noted in 26 (13%), 106 (53%), 35 (17.5%) and 78 (39%) females respectively. This study concluded that the most common fetomaternal outcome was prematurity, low birth weight babies, partial HELLP syndrome, perinatal mortality, eclampsia and maternal mortality in patients with pre-eclampsia.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenan Gümüştekin ◽  
Zekeriya Aktürk

Abstract Objectives This study aimed to describe the academic losses resulting from the Turkish purge and associated dismissals with the decree laws following the failed coup attempt in 2016 concerning physiology academics. Methods An observational study was conducted covering the time before 2008, 2009–2012, 2013–2016, and 2017–2020. All actively-working assistant, associate, and full professors of physiology in Turkey as of 15th July 2016 and recently hired academic staff after the coup attempt in 2016 were included in the study. Data collection was performed in December 2020. The primary outcome variable of the study was the total number of publications listed in Google Scholar. Results Data of 271 academics were analyzed. Of the participants, 209 (87.1%) continued on their positions, 31 (12.9%) were dismissed after the 2016 coup attempt, and 31 were hired after the purge. The number of publications of scholars hired before 2016 and dismissed were significantly higher before 2008, between 2009 and 2012, and between 2013 and 2016 compared to scholars hired before 2016 and not purged (p < 0.05). Also, the total number of citations, H-index, and i10-index values were significantly better in the purged individuals (p < 0.05). Although the purged academics had relatively higher performance indicators in the previous years, they experienced a 44.2% loss in the number of publications after 2016. Conclusion The mass dismissals after the coup attempt in 2016 harmed individual physiology academics as well as the general physiology academy. International academic and human rights organizations must be more sensitive to protect scholars who undergo similar persecutions.


2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 74-77
Author(s):  
Mohammad Enayet Hussain ◽  
Bithi Debnath ◽  
AFM Al Masum Khan ◽  
Md Ferdous Mian ◽  
Md Nahidul Islam ◽  
...  

Background: The visual evoked potentials (VEP) is a valuable tool to document occult lesions of the central visual channels especially within the optic nerve. Objectives: The purpose of the present study was to observe the findings of first few cases of VEP done in the neurophysiology department of the National Institute of Neurosciences (NINS), Dhaka, Bangladesh. Methodology: This cross-sectional study was conducted in the Department of Neurophysiology at the National Institute of Neurosciences and Hospital, Dhaka, Bangladesh from September 2017 to March 2020. All patients referred to the Neurophysiology Department of NINS for VEP were included. Pattern reversal VEPs were done using standard protocol set by International Federation of Clinical Neurophysiology (IFCN). Results: The mean age of the study population was 30.70 (±12.11) years (6-68 years) with 31 (46.3%) male and 36 (53.7%) female patients. The mean duration of illness was 8.71 (±1.78) months (3 days- 120 months). Most common presenting symptom was blurring of vision (37.3%) and dimness of vision (32.8%). Patterned VEP revealed mixed type (both demyelinating and axonal) of abnormality in most cases [29(43.35)]. The most common clinical diagnosis was multiple sclerosis (29.85%) and optic neuropathy (26.87%). In the clinically suspected cases of multiple sclerosis, optic neuropathy and optic neuritis most of the cases of VEP were abnormal and the p value is 0.04 in optic neuropathy and optic neuritis. Conclusion: The commonest presentation of the patients in this series were blurring of vision and dimness of vision. The most common clinical diagnosis for which VEP was asked for, was optic neuritis and multiple sclerosis. Most abnormalities were of mixed pattern (demyelinating and axonal). Journal of National Institute of Neurosciences Bangladesh, 2020;6(2): 74-77


2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Chijioke Okeudo ◽  
B.U. Ezem

Background: The amniotic fluid is fundamental for proper fetal development and growth. Ultrasound visualization of the amniotic fluid permits both subjective and objective estimates of the amniotic fluid. Objective: The objective of this study was to determine the reference values of normal single deepest pocket (SDP) – upper and lower limits, mean SDP and variation of the SDP with gestational age among Igbo women of South-Eastern Nigeria extraction carrying uncomplicated singleton pregnancy. Methodology: This was a prospective cross sectional study involving 400 women carrying uncomplicated singleton pregnancies and who were sure of the date of the first day of their last menstrual period. The single deepest pocket / maximum vertical pool were determined once at presentation at the hospital.. The study was conducted from January 1st to December 31st 2015. The second author carried out all the scanning. The SDP was obtained. Results: The womens’ mean and median ages were the same at 28 years. The gestational age range of the pregnancies was 14-41 weeks. The mean SDP was 5.8cm, while the 5th and 95th percentiles were 3.3cm and 8.5cm respectively. There was no difference in the mean SDP in both term and preterm. There was irregular but continuous rise of mean SDP to a peak of 6.8cm at gestational age of 39 weeks. In conclusion, the participants had a mean SDP of 5.8cm. There was also a positive correlation between SDP and Gestational age. We therefore recommend a longitudinal study to assess perinatal outcome and abnormal amniotic fluid volume among Igbo women of South-Eastern Nigeria. Key words: Single Deepest Pocket, Uncomplicated Singleton Pregnancy, Igbo Women.


2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 012-017
Author(s):  
Najib Zouhair ◽  
Anass Chaouki ◽  
Amine M’khatri ◽  
Youssef Oukessou ◽  
Sami Rouadi ◽  
...  

Tympanoplasty is one of the most performed procedures in ENT. The aggressiveness of its microscopic approach has led otologists to adopt the endoscopic approach as a less invasive alternative. The purpose of this work is to appreciate the advantages and disadvantages of this surgical technique. We conducted a prospective descriptive cross-sectional study on 20 interventions within the ENT department of August the 20th 1953 Hospital of Casablanca from April 2019 to June 2019. The average age of operated patients was 36.3 years. Perforations were unilateral in (71%) of the cases with a predominance of the anterior (29%) and subtotal (36%) locations. The tympanoplasties were performed by 3 different senior otologic surgeons, and were left in (57%). The mean operating time was (59.5 min) and the mean anesthesia duration was 75.1 min. Intraoperative vision allowed us to fully visualize the margins of all perforations (100%) and anatomical structures of the middle ear in almost all interventions. The first procedures carried out were filled with difficulties whose management of intraoperative bleeding was the main one in (42.8%) of the cases. (57%) procedures were described as easy. No complication was detected intraoperatively or immediately postoperatively. Endoscopic tympanoplasty has several advantages, including: Minimally invasive approach to the middle ear; panoramic perioperative vision; Gain of operating time; decrease in the duration of anesthesia; Valuable educational tool; postoperative comfort; Decrease in hospital stay and early return to daily activities; Better aesthetic rendering; cost and transportability. However, we also note a number of disadvantages of endoscopic tympanoplasty, particularly: performing the procedure with one hand; difficulty passing through the EAC; 2D vision that alters the perception of depth; management of intraoperative bleeding; fogging; learning curve.


2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 141-145
Author(s):  
Krishna Chandra Devkota ◽  
S Hamal ◽  
PP Panta

Pleural effusion is present when there is >15ml of fluid is accumulated in the pleural space. It can be divided into two types; exudative and transudative pleural effusion. Tuberculosis and parapneumonic effusion are the common cause of exudative pleural effusion whereas heart failure accounts for most of the cases of transudative pleural effusion. This study was a hospital based cross sectional study performed at Nepal Medical College during the period of January 2016-December 2016. A total of 50 patients who fulfilled the inclusion criteria were enrolled. Pleural effusion was confirmed by clinical examination and radiology. After confirmation of pleural effusion, pleural fluid was aspirated and was analysed for protein, LDH, cholesterol. The Heffner criteria was compared with Light criteria to classify exudative or transudative pleural effusion. Among 50 patients, 30 were male and 20 were female. The mean age of patient was 45.4±21.85 years. The sensitivity and specificity of using Light criteria to detect the two type of pleural effusion was 100% and 90.9%, whereas using Heffner criteria was 94.87%, 100% respectively(P<0.01). There are variety of causes for development of pleural effusion and no one criteria is definite to differentiate between exudative or transudative effusion. In this study Light criteria was more sensitive whereas Heffner criteria was more specific to classify exudative pleural effusion. Hence a combination of criteria might be useful in case where there is difficulty to identify the cause of pleural effusion.


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