Coordination of Social Communication, Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
PLoS One. 2013 Aug 20;8(8):e71415. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0071415. eCollection 2013.
To map and investigate the relationships established on the web between leading health-research institutions around the world.
Sample selection was based on the World Health Organization (WHO) Collaborating Centres (CCs). Data on the 768 active CCs in 89 countries were retrieved from the WHO's database. The final sample consisted of 190 institutions devoted to health sciences in 42 countries. Data on each institution's website were retrieved using webometric techniques (interlinking), and an asymmetric matrix was generated for social network analysis.
The results showed that American and European institutions, such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the National Institute of Health and Medical Research (INSERM), are the most highly connected on the web and have a higher capacity to attract hyperlinks. The Karolinska Institute (KI-SE) in Sweden is well placed as an articulation point between several integrants of the network and the component's core but lacks general recognition on the web by hyperlinks. Regarding the north-south divide, Mexico and Brazil appear to be key southern players on the web. The results showed that the hyperlinks exchanged between northern and southern countries present an abysmal gap: 99.49% of the hyperlinks provided by the North are directed toward the North itself, in contrast to 0.51% that are directed toward the South. Regarding the South, its institutions are more connected to its northern partners, with 98.46% of its hyperlinks directed toward the North, and mainly toward the United States, compared with 1.54% toward southern neighbors.
It is advisable to strengthen integration policies on the web and to increase web networking through hyperlink exchange. In this way, the web could actually reflect international cooperation in health and help to legitimize and enhance the visibility of the many existing south-south collaboration networks.
绘制并研究全球主要卫生研究机构在网络上建立的关系。
样本选择基于世界卫生组织（WHO）合作中心（CC）。从世卫组织数据库中检索了 89 个国家中 768 个活跃 CC 的数据。最终样本包括 42 个国家的 190 个致力于健康科学的机构。使用网络计量技术（链接）检索每个机构网站的数据，并生成用于社会网络分析的非对称矩阵。
结果表明，美国和欧洲的机构，如疾病控制与预防中心（CDC）、美国国立卫生研究院（NIH）和法国国家卫生与医学研究所（INSERM），在网络上的链接最为紧密，吸引超链接的能力也更强。瑞典的卡罗林斯卡学院（KI-SE）在网络的几个整合部分之间以及组件核心中处于很好的衔接点位置，但在网络上缺乏通过超链接获得的普遍认可。关于南北差距，墨西哥和巴西似乎是网络上的关键南方参与者。结果表明，北方和南方国家之间交换的超链接存在巨大差距：北方提供的超链接中，99.49%指向北方本身，而 0.51%指向南方。就南方而言，其机构与北方伙伴的联系更为紧密，98.46%的超链接指向北方，主要是美国，而 1.54%指向南方邻国。
建议加强网络上的整合政策，并通过超链接交换增加网络联网。这样，网络实际上可以反映卫生领域的国际合作，并有助于使许多现有的南南合作网络合法化和提高其可见度。
