Methodological quality in clinical trials and bibliometric indicators: no evidence of correlations

Derya Akcan (), Susanna Axelsson (), Christina Bergh (), Thomas Davidson () and Måns Rosén ()
Additional contact information
Derya Akcan: Swedish Council on Health Technology Assessment (SBU)
Susanna Axelsson: Swedish Council on Health Technology Assessment (SBU)
Christina Bergh: Gothenburg University
Thomas Davidson: Swedish Council on Health Technology Assessment (SBU)
Måns Rosén: Swedish Council on Health Technology Assessment (SBU)

Scientometrics, 2013, vol. 96, issue 1, No 19, 297-303

Abstract: Abstract Citation frequencies and journal impact factors (JIFs) are being used more and more to assess the quality of research and allocate research resources. If these bibliometric indicators are not an adequate predictor of research quality, there could be severe negative consequences for research. To analyse to which extent citation frequencies and journal impact factors correlate with the methodological quality of clinical research articles included in an SBU systematic review of antibiotic prophylaxis in surgery. All 212 eligible original articles were extracted from the SBU systematic review “Antibiotic Prophylaxis in Surgery” and categorized according to their methodological rigourness as high, moderate or low quality articles. Median of citation frequencies and JIFs were compared between the methodological quality groups using Kruskal–Wallis non-parametric test. An in-depth study of low-quality studies with higher citation frequencies/JIFs was also conducted. No significant differences were found in median citation frequencies (p = 0.453) or JIFs (p = 0.185) between the three quality groups. Studies that had high citation frequencies/JIFs but were assessed as low-quality lacked control groups, had high dropout rates or low internal validity. This study of antibiotic prophylaxis in surgery does not support the hypothesis that bibliometric indicators are a valid instrument for assessing methodological quality in clinical trials. This is a worrying observation, since bibliometric indicators have a major influence on research funding. However, further studies in other areas are needed.

Keywords: Bibliometric analysis; Citations; Impact factor; Study quality; HTA (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11192-013-0949-0 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:scient:v:96:y:2013:i:1:d:10.1007_s11192-013-0949-0

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/11192

DOI: 10.1007/s11192-013-0949-0

Access Statistics for this article

Scientometrics is currently edited by Wolfgang Glänzel

More articles in Scientometrics from Springer, Akadémiai Kiadó
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().