This slide set summarizes a poster presented at a medical library conference about the growth of citations related to food, diet and nutrition in PubMed. It finds that for many topics like fruit and vegetables, citations remained flat until around 1990 and then began rising rapidly. As a control, heart showed steady growth similar to all citations in PubMed. Charts on the poster and in the slides compare growth rates for various food and diet topics to all PubMed citations. Images included are licensed for educational use.

1. The Growth of Food-Diet-
Nutrition Literature in PubMed
This slide set is based on a poster presented at the
Medical Library Association annual meeting in
Austin, Texas, in May 2015. Go to the next slide to
see the poster.
Xiaomei Gu, MSLS, Janna C. Lawrence, MLIS, Eric Rumsey MLS

2. For details about the poster, and how this slide set is related to it, go to the next slide.

3. The charts and introductory information
at the top of the poster are on the next 3
slides. It’s helpful to look at this before
going ahead to the slides that follow,
which are expanded versions of the
charts for the individual food-diet-
nutrition subjects on the poster.
All of the images that accompany the
charts are licensed for educational use;
rights information is given for all images
at the end of the slide set.

4. All citations vs Fruit
We have discovered that for
many food-diet-nutrition (FDN)
subjects, the growth in citations
in PubMed increased greatly
about 1990. For our study, we
searched PubMed for FDN-
related words in the article title,
and compared this to the
growth rate for all citations in
PubMed (all searches were
limited to human subjects). The
chart below shows the growth
rate for fruit (orange) and for all
citations (grey). This shows that
the growth rate for fruit
remained essentially flat until
about 1990, then began its
rapid rise.

5. All citations vs Vegetables
Searching for vegetables shows a
similar pattern, remaining fairly
flat until about 1990, then
beginning to rise.

6. All citations vs Heart
As a “control,” we also searched for
general medical words. They
generally showed a growth pattern
similar to all citations, as shown
below for heart.
The slides that follow show the citation
growth rate for a variety of food-diet-
nutrition related subjects. They all have a
pattern similar to fruit and vegetables,
with increasing growth after about 1990.

7. Soft Drink
For reference, the charts
below show the rapid rise in
citations for fruit & vegetables
after 1990 (about half way
across the charts). Heart is
representative of general
medical subjects, which have
grown at about the same rate
as all citations in PubMed. For
larger versions of the charts
below and more explanation,
go to slides 2-4.
Fruit
Vegetables
Heart

8. Sweet Potato

9. Breakfast

10. Pomegranate

11. Fast Food

12. Chocolate

13. Red meat

14. Olive Oil

15. Tea

16. Turmeric

17. Beef

18. Tomato

19. Obesity

20. Strawberries

21. Cranberry

22. Meat

23. Dietary Fiber

24. Coffee

25. Blueberry

26. Omega 3

27. Broccoli

28. Credits for images
All images are public domain or licensed to use with attribution. Google
Image Search was invaluable in finding the images. Of the 22 images, 17 are
from Wikimedia, 3 from Pixabay, and 2 are personal photos.
Soft drink
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dr_Browns_line_12oz.jpg
Sweet potato
Personal photo
Breakfast
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bacon_and_egg_sandwich_-_open_face.JPG
Pomegranate
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Granatapfel_2013.jpg
Fast food
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:In-N-
Out_Burger_triple_cheeseburgers_and_fries.jpg
Chocolate
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:ChocolateA.jpg
Red meat
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Standing-rib-roast.jpg
Olive Oil
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Olive_oil_from_Oneglia.jpg
Tea
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tea_in_different_grade_of_fermentation.jpg
Turmeric
Personal photo
Beef
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Texas_Longhorn_logo.svg
Tomato
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:End_of_Summer_Tomatoes.jpg
Obesity
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Obesity-waist_circumference.svg
Strawberries
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:PerfectStrawberry.jpg
Cranberry
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cranberries20101210.jpg
Meat
http://pixabay.com/en/chicken-broiler-meat-1140/
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Minced_beef_meat_cow_cattle.png
Dietary fiber
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Quaker_Oats_advertisement_1905.jpg
Coffee
http://pixabay.com/en/coffee-cafe-coffee-cream-restaurant-206142/
Blueberry
http://pixabay.com/p-2271/
Omega 3
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Salmon_Fish.JPG
Broccoli
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Broccoli_DSC00861.png