Zhang Chen, Feng Xinzhe, Wang Chen, Liu Denghui, He Chongru, Xu Weidong
Department of Orthopedics, Changhai Hospital, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, China.
Department of Traumatic Orthopedics, No. 906 Hospital, Ningbo, China.
PeerJ. 2019 Apr 25;7:e6825. doi: 10.7717/peerj.6825. eCollection 2019.
Rheumatology-related diseases remain a significant burden worldwide. However, little is known about the comparative status of rheumatology research between Mainland China (MC) and the world's leading countries. The aim of this study is to compare the quantity and quality of research output in the field of rheumatology that were written by researchers from MC, the USA, the UK, the Netherlands and France.
Between 2007 and 2017, all articles published in 30 rheumatology journals were identified via Science Citation Index Expanded database. The number of total and annual articles, article types (randomized controlled trials (RCTs), reviews, case reports, clinical trials and meta-analysis), impact factor (IF), citations, h-index and articles in the high-impact journals were collected for quantity and quality comparisons. The correlation of socioeconomic factors and annual publications was also analyzed.
From 2007 to 2017, there were 53,439 articles published in rheumatology journals, of which researchers from the USA published 13,391 articles, followed by the UK, the Netherlands, France and MC with 6,179, 4,310, 4,066 and 2,898 articles, respectively. Publications from MC represented the ninth, but the number is growing rapidly. For total and average citations, MC still lags behind the other four countries in the study. Similar trends were observed in average IF, h-index and articles in the high-impact journals. In terms of article types, the USA occupies the dominant place, except for meta-analysis. The annual numbers of articles from MC and the USA were positively correlated with gross domestic product ( < 0.05).
The USA has played predominant role in rheumatology research for the last 11 years. The annual number of published articles from MC has increased notably from 2007 to 2017. Although MC has made progress in the number of published articles over the past decade, it still lags far behind the highly developed countries in most bibliometric indicators. Thus, the general quality of publications from MC needs further improvement.
风湿病相关疾病在全球范围内仍是一项重大负担。然而，关于中国大陆（MC）与世界主要国家之间风湿病研究的比较状况，人们了解甚少。本研究的目的是比较来自MC、美国、英国、荷兰和法国的研究人员在风湿病领域的研究产出数量和质量。
2007年至2017年期间，通过科学引文索引扩展数据库确定了在30种风湿病杂志上发表的所有文章。收集了文章总数和年发表量、文章类型（随机对照试验（RCT）、综述、病例报告、临床试验和荟萃分析）、影响因子（IF）、被引频次、h指数以及高影响力期刊上的文章数量，以进行数量和质量比较。还分析了社会经济因素与年出版物数量之间的相关性。
2007年至2017年，风湿病杂志共发表53439篇文章，其中美国研究人员发表13391篇文章，其次是英国、荷兰、法国和MC，分别为6179篇、4310篇、4066篇和2898篇。MC的出版物数量位居第九，但增长迅速。在总被引频次和平均被引频次方面，MC在本研究中仍落后于其他四个国家。在平均影响因子、h指数和高影响力期刊上的文章数量方面也观察到类似趋势。在文章类型方面，除荟萃分析外，美国占据主导地位。MC和美国的年文章数量与国内生产总值呈正相关（<0.05）。
在过去11年中，美国在风湿病研究中发挥了主导作用。从2007年到2017年，MC每年发表的文章数量显著增加。尽管MC在过去十年中发表文章的数量有所进步，但在大多数文献计量指标上仍远远落后于高度发达国家。因此，MC出版物的总体质量需要进一步提高。
