Advanced neonatal medicine in China: a quantitative analysis of research productivity and impact factors

Abstract

Objectives: To summarize academic productivity of neonatal medicine in China and explore its relationship with health care workforce and activities.

Methods: We retrospectively extracted data from national key clinical subspecialty proposals, and used accessible databases as Science Citation Index (SCI), PubMed, and National Natural Science Foundation of China.

Results: Between 2008 and 2010, 61 newborn units at the most advanced level in 31 cities from 28 of 31 provincial districts in mainland China were included. Fifty-two national or international projects and 111 provincial projects were conducted. A total of 171 articles were listed in the SCI database; 23 patents were registered. There were 83 oral presentations in international conferences abroad. One national and 40 provincial government awards were received. Health workforce indexes, such as physicians with MD&PhD degrees, were significantly related to academic productivity. National or international projects (β = .285, p <.001; 95% CI = 0.179, 0.391) and the number of newborn beds (β = .005, p = .016; 95% CI = 0.001, 0.008) were two underlying factors to determine government awards (adjusted R² =  .426). The 10 main cities for neonatal medicine research were also listed.

Conclusion: In this study, we established the baseline information on neonatal medicine research in China, which could provide information for further practice.

Keywords:

• Bibliometric
• neonatal medicine
• academic productivity
• health workforce
• China

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the scholarship from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research - Quebec Training Network in Perinatal Research Program. We thank Professor William D. Fraser at Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Sherbrooke (CHUS) Research Centre, Sherbrooke, Canada, for his comments of the manuscript. We are extremely thankful to the government agencies for providing open access to the data, and to physicians, nurses, information engineers, and other staffs to collect data from the participating hospitals.

Disclosure statement

The authors report no declarations of interest.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by the scholarship from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research – Quebec Training Network in Perinatal Research Program.