Does quality of research in otolaryngology correlate with academic impact?

Abstract

Objective: To determine if the quality of otolaryngology-related journal articles correlates with traditional measures of article impact. Methods: All articles published by Laryngoscope in 2011 were categorized according to level of evidence (LOE) according to the Oxford Center for Evidence Based Medicine rubric. Articles without a level of evidence assigned were alphabetically subcategorized type with letters AD corresponding to Contemporary Reports, Case Reports, Basic Science or Animal Studies, and Other respectively. Citations per article were then recorded per article each year from 2012 to 2018. Results: A total of 494 articles were included for analysis, 315 had numerical LOE and 179 had alphabetical LOE. There was a strong negative correlation between numerical LOE and median and interquartile number of citations (R = −.9014, P = .037). Overall, numerical LOE had a significantly higher median number of citations per article compared with the non-number/alphabetical group (14 vs 6, P < .001). Conclusions: Higher quality research as determined by level of evidence is in fact being cited more frequently than lower quality articles. Although the scope of this study was relatively limited, these data suggest that better designed studies may exhibit greater impact by traditional measures. Such findings should serve as an impetus for (and validation of) continued pursuit of high LOE research.

Social Media and Academic Impact: Do Early Tweets Correlate with Future Citations?

“…Quality, as measured by Level of Evidence, is known to correlate with citations in Otolaryngology. 17 Secondly, because of the nature of academic literature reviews, original research and review articles are widely sought out by manuscript authors and thus become highly cited compared to editorials or letters to the editors. For now, citation-based metrics are likely more accurate reflections of knowledge diffusion and should still be considered the gold standard over Altmetrics when it comes to academic impact.…”

The Quality of Otology and Neurotology Research in Otology Journals

“…Certainly the growing number of academic otolaryngologists and their clinical research output is playing a role. Yet with limited space in journals and an eye towards improving impact factors, editors and publishers alike can be more selective as priority is given to higher quality articles that are more likely to be cited (21). While the quality of O/N publications appears to be moving in the right direction, we should also bear in mind that there is room for improvement.…”