Hu Jiayi, Gholami Arian, Stone Nicholas, Bartoszko Justyna, Thoma Achilleas
Division of Plastic Surgery, Department of Surgery, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
Faculty of Medicine, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
Plast Surg (Oakv). 2018 Feb;26(1):5-10. doi: 10.1177/2292550317749508. Epub 2018 Jan 9.
Evaluation of research productivity among plastic surgeons can be complex. The Hirsch index (h-index) was recently introduced to evaluate both the quality and quantity of one's research activity. It has been proposed to be valuable in assessing promotions and grant funding within academic medicine, including plastic surgery. Our objective is to evaluate research productivity among Canadian academic plastic surgeons using the h-index.
A list of Canadian academic plastic surgeons was obtained from websites of academic training programs. The h-index was retrieved using the Scopus database. Relevant demographic and academic factors were collected and their effects on the h-index were analyzed using the test and Wilcoxon Mann-Whitney test. Nominal and categorical variables were analyzed using χ test and 1-way analysis of variance. Univariate and multivariate models were built a priori. All values were 2 sided, and < .05 was considered to be significant.
Our study on Canadian plastic surgeons involved 175 surgeons with an average h-index of 7.6. Over 80% of the surgeons were male. Both univariable and multivariable analysis showed that graduate degree ( < .0001), academic rank ( = .03), and years in practice ( < .0001) were positively correlated with h-index. Limitations of the study include that the Scopus database and the websites of training programs were not always up-to-date.
The h-index is a novel tool for evaluating research productivity in academic medicine, and this study shows that the h-index can also serve as a useful metric for measuring research productivity in the Canadian plastic surgery community. Plastic surgeons would be wise to familiarize themselves with the h-index concept and should consider using it as an adjunct to existing metrics such as total publication number.
整形外科医生研究产出的评估可能很复杂。赫希指数（h指数）最近被引入以评估个人研究活动的质量和数量。有人提出它在评估学术医学（包括整形外科）中的晋升和资助资金方面具有价值。我们的目的是使用h指数评估加拿大整形外科医生的研究产出。
从学术培训项目网站获取加拿大整形外科医生名单。使用Scopus数据库检索h指数。收集相关人口统计学和学术因素，并使用t检验和Wilcoxon Mann-Whitney检验分析它们对h指数的影响。使用χ²检验和单因素方差分析分析名义变量和分类变量。先验构建单变量和多变量模型。所有p值均为双侧，p <.05被认为具有统计学意义。
我们对加拿大整形外科医生的研究涉及175名医生，平均h指数为7.6。超过80%的医生为男性。单变量和多变量分析均显示，研究生学位（p <.0001）、学术职称（p =.03）和从业年限（p <.0001）与h指数呈正相关。该研究的局限性包括Scopus数据库和培训项目网站并不总是最新的。
h指数是评估学术医学研究产出的一种新工具，本研究表明h指数也可作为衡量加拿大整形外科领域研究产出的有用指标。整形外科医生明智的做法是熟悉h指数概念，并应考虑将其作为现有指标（如总发表数量）的补充。
