Appreciation of literature by the anaesthetist: A comparison of citations, downloads and Altmetric Attention Score

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3 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Background: Different metrics exist to evaluate the impact of a paper. Traditionally, scientific citations are leading, but nowadays new, internet-based, metrics like downloads or Altmetric Attention Score receive increasing attention. We hypothesised a gap between these metrics, reflected by a divergence between scientific and clinical appreciation of anaesthesia literature. Methods: We collected the top 100 most cited and the top 100 most downloaded articles in Acta Anaesthesiologica Scandinavica (AAS) and Anesthesia & Analgesia (A&A) published between 2014 and 2018. We analysed the relationship between the average number of citations per year, downloads per year and Altmetric Attention Score. Results: For both AAS and A&A, a significant correlation between the 100 most cited articles and their downloads (r =.573 and.603, respectively, P <.001) was found. However, only a poor correlation with Altmetric Attention Score was determined. For the 100 most downloaded articles, download frequency did not correlate with their number of citations (r =.035 and.139 respectively), but did correlate significantly with the Altmetric Attention Score (r =.458 and.354, P <.001). Conclusion: Highly cited articles are downloaded more frequently. The most downloaded articles, however, did not receive more citations. In contrast to the most cited articles, more frequently downloaded papers had a higher Altmetric Attention Score. Thus, a ‘trending’ anaesthesia paper is not a prerequisite for scientific appreciation, reflecting a gap between clinical and scientific appreciation of literature.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)823-828
Number of pages6
JournalActa anaesthesiologica Scandinavica
Volume64
Issue number6
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Jul 2020

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