title: Lost in publication: Half of all renal practice evidence is published in non-renal journals.
abstract: Physicians often scan a select number of journals to keep up to date with practice evidence for patients with kidney conditions. This raises the question of where relevant studies are published. We performed a bibliometric analysis using 195 renal systematic reviews. Each review used a comprehensive method to identify all primary studies for a focused clinical question relevant to patient care. We compiled all the primary studies included in these reviews, and considered where each study was published. Of the 2779 studies, 1351 (49%) were published in the top 20 journals. Predictably, this list included Transplantation Proceedings (5.9% of studies), Kidney International (5.3%), American Journal of Kidney Diseases (4.7%), Nephrology Dialysis Transplantation (4.3%), Transplantation (4.2%), and Journal of the American Society of Nephrology (2.4%). Ten non-renal journals were also on this list, including New England Journal of Medicine (2.4%), Lancet (2.3%), and Diabetes Care (2.2%). The remaining 1428 (51%) studies were published across other 446 journals. When the disciplines of all journals were considered, 59 were classified as renal or transplant journals (42% of articles). Other specialties included general and internal medicine (16%), endocrinology (diabetes) and metabolism (6.5%), surgery (6.2%), cardiovascular diseases (6.1%), pediatrics (4.3%), and radiology (3.3%). About half of all renal practice evidence is published in non-renal journals. Browsing the top journals is important. However, relevant studies are also scattered across a large range of journals that may not be routinely scanned by busy physicians, and keeping up with this literature requires other continuing education strategies.
authors.affiliation: Division of Nephrology, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada. amit.garg@lhsc.on.ca
authors.forename: A X
authors.initials: AX
authors.lastname: Garg
authors.forename: A V
authors.initials: AV
authors.lastname: Iansavichus
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kastner
authors.forename: L A
authors.initials: LA
authors.lastname: Walters
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Wilczynski
authors.forename: K A
authors.initials: KA
authors.lastname: McKibbon
authors.forename: R C
authors.initials: RC
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Rehman
authors.forename: R B
authors.initials: RB
authors.lastname: Haynes
mesh_terms: D019317:Evidence-Based Medicine; D006801:Humans; D007674:Kidney Diseases; D016030:Kidney Transplantation; D009398:Nephrology; D010506:Periodicals as Topic; D006435:Renal Dialysis