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Association between quality of clinical practice guidelines and citations given to their references
The document investigates the relationship between the quality of clinical practice guidelines (CPGs) and the citations of their references, focusing on the 'rigour of development' aspect assessed via the AGREE instrument. The study found a medium-strength correlation between the A3 scores of CPGs and the citation counts of their references, without significant confounding factors. However, it concludes that more data is needed to understand potential connections between citation metrics, clinical evidence, and health impacts.
Association between quality of clinical practice guidelines and citations given to their references
- 1. ASSOCIATION BETWEEN QUALITY OFCLINICAL PRACTICE GUIDELINES AND CITATIONS GIVEN TO THEIR REFERENCES JENS PETER ANDERSEN MEDICAL LIBRARY, AALBORG UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL ROYAL SCHOOL OF LIBRARY AND INFORMATION SCIENCE, UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN
- 2. ”In some waysbibliometrics is at the stage of European navigation in the middle ages. The familiar territory is well, even obsessively, charted but beyond te known world there are only unknown dragons on the map:” Lewison, 2002, p. 191
- 3. SETTING SAIL… Clinical practiceguidelines (CPGs) as study object: - Recommendations about best treatment and diagnosis for specific diseases. - Varying quality of CPGs. They are supposed to be based on the best research evidence – not all are.
- 4. LET’S AGREE The AGREEinstrument assesses six groups of variables pertaining to the quality of CPGs. The most elaborate group, A3, is labelled ”Rigour of development” and pertains to the ways in which evidence was sought, assessed and included in and from the literature.
- 5. RESEARCH QUESTION Is therea connection between the A3-score of CPGs and the citations given to their references?
- 6. METHODS A3 scores werecollected from reviews of CPGs containing AGREE-scores. CPGs were extracted from Web of Science where possible. All references from CPGs were extracted. All citation scores of articles published in the same year and journal as CPG references were extracted as control group.
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- 9. MATERIALS II A1 A2A3 A4 A5 A6 Acum 0.00.20.40.60.81.0 AGREE categories AGREEscores Included Excluded 0.00.20.40.60.81.0 Guideline category A3score
- 10. RESULTS – CITATION DISTRIBUTION 15 10 50 100 500 5000 110100100010000 log(rank) log(citationcount) -5 0 5 10 0.00.20.40.60.81.0 Standard deviations from mean Density
- 11. RESULTS II –MAIN FINDINGS 0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 -1.0-0.50.00.51.01.52.0 A3 Z cor = 0.471, r^2 = 0.222 0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 0.00.20.40.60.81.0 A3 PPtop-10% cor = 0.457, r^2 = 0.209
- 12. RESULTS III – CONFOUNDERS? 0100 200 300 400 500 600 -1.0-0.50.00.51.01.52.0 Number of references Z cor = 0.0305, r^2 = 0.000933 0 20 40 60 80 -1.0-0.50.00.51.01.52.0 citations / year Z cor = 0.239, r^2 = 0.0571 0 20 40 60 80 0.00.20.40.60.8 citations / year A3 cor = 0.371, r^2 = 0.00036 0 100 200 300 400 500 600 0.00.20.40.60.81.0 Number of references PPtop-10% cor = 0.019, r^2 = 0.0429 0 20 40 60 80 0.00.20.40.60.81.0 citations / year PPtop-10% cor = 0.207, r^2 = 0.137 0 20 40 60 80 0.20.30.40.50.60.70.8 citations / year Acum cor = 0.317, r^2 = 0.101
- 13. RESULTS IV A medium-strengthcorrelation between A3 score and citedness of references. No apparent confounding from reference list length or citedness of CPGs. More data required. Results are indicative of connections between citations, clinical evidence and health impact – but there is no evidence of causative mechanisms here.
- 14. DISCUSSION Can references fromother document types than journal articles broaden the impact concept? If a study is cited by a CPG, is this a clinical impact, or policy impact – different from academic citation impact? CPGs as mega-citations in specific contexts?
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