The impact of case reports in oral and maxillofacial surgery

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijom.2012.03.007Get rights and content

Abstract

This review examines the effect of publishing case reports on journal impact factor and future research. All case reports published in the four major English language oral and maxillofacial surgery journals in the two year period, 2007–2008, were searched manually. The citation data of each case report were retrieved from the ISI online database. The number, percentage and mean citations received by case reports and their relation to the 2009 journal impact factor were analysed. Case reports which received more than 5 citations were also identified and all of the citing articles retrieved and analysed. Thirty-one percent of all articles published in major oral and maxillofacial journals in 2007–2008 were case reports. Case reports had a low citation rate with a mean citation of less than 1. There were 38 (7.2%) case reports with more than 5 citations and 30% of the citing articles were also case reports. The publication of case reports negatively affected journal impact factor which correlated directly with the percentage of case reports published within a journal. Case reports reporting recent topics, describing new treatment/diagnosis method and with a literature review were more likely to receive citations.

Section snippets

Materials and methods

All CRs published in major English language OMS journals (Table 1) from January 2007 to December 2008 were searched manually by the first author. The period was selected to assess the current situation while also giving enough time for any citing article to be published. The CRs were identified by screening the title and abstract of all published articles in 2007 and 2008 within each journal. The full text of articles was retrieved when data from the title/abstract were insufficient to make a

The effect of CRs on journal IF

During the period of study (January 2007–December 2008), BJOMS published the highest percentage of CRs of their total number of published articles while JCMS published the lowest percentage (Table 3). Regarding the total number of CRs published, JOMS published the highest absolute number of CRs followed by BJOMS, IJOMS and JCMS (Table 3). When the number of citations received by CRs was examined, a direct relationship was noted between the number of CRs published within a particular journal and

Discussion

EBM is defined as the conscientious, explicit, and judicious use of current best evidence in making decisions about the care of individual patients.8 EBM hierarchy places SRs, meta-analyses and RCTs at the highest level of evidence while CRs are at the opposing end of the hierarchy.9, 10 Although considered low level evidence, CRs may well be the ‘best available evidence’ in clinical practice. Pitak-Arnnop et al. recently wrote an excellent review on the application of EBM in the OMS field in

Funding

None.

Competing interests

None declared.

Ethical approval

Not required.

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