Prevention, Diagnosis, and Management of Upper Extremity Lymphedema Complications: Altmetric Analysis of Online Media

Abstract

Background: Traditional citation-based metrics do not capture the dissemination of upper extremity lymphedema (UEL) research that occurs online and in mainstream media. There is limited literature reporting the most impactful UEL articles based on citation rate and/or online mentions. We sought to use the Altmetric Attention Score (AAS) to determine the most impactful UEL articles in online media and to report trends in the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of complications. Methods: The Altmetric database was queried to identify all published articles regarding the management, diagnosis, and prevention of complications seen in the setting of UEL. Extracted data points included article topic and type, journal, and number of online mentions on several platforms. Results: Our index search yielded 638 studies published between 2000 and 2021. Fifty articles with the highest AAS scores were included for analysis. The median AAS was 27.5, but the top four articles had AAS scores that were substantially higher (AAS ≥ 334) than all other studies. Of the top 50 articles, 68% (34/50) were original research. Of those, 23.5% (8/34) were randomized control trials. The most common article topic was the treatment of UEL (36%; 18/50) followed by diagnostic methods of UEL (30%; 15/50). There were a total of 1156 Twitter mentions (median:14) for the top 50 articles. Of all media platforms, news mentions correlated most strongly with AAS (R 2 = 0.99, P < 0.001). Conclusions: Our findings suggest that alternative metrics measure distinct components of article impact and add an important dimension to understanding the overall impact of published research on UEL.

The 50 most impactful articles on the medial ulnar collateral ligament: An altmetric analysis of online media

“…9 Previous studies have used the AAS to identify the most impactful articles in online media that relate to a variety of medical subspecialties. 10 – 13 …”

“…9 Previous studies have used the AAS to identify the most impactful articles in online media that relate to a variety of medical subspecialties. [10][11][12][13] AAS is determined by the volume of mentions, the source of each mention, and the authors who mention the article. 14 The AAS factors the source of the mentions, with certain online platforms such as Facebook carrying a different weight than a news mention.…”