title: A bibliometric study of international scientific productivity in giardiasis covering the period 1971-2010.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Despite years of relative neglect, interest in Giardia infection seems to be recently growing, perhaps in part due to its inclusion into the World Health Organization's Neglected Diseases Initiative since 2004. The purpose of this study was to provide an overview of Giardia and giardiasis research over time, as represented by the quantity of published papers.
  
  
  METHODS
  Data for this study were collected from the electronic PubMed/Medline database of National Library of Medicine's (NLM), due to it is easily accessibility and wide use. It was accessed online between April and December 2011. Data for the period 1971-2010 were obtained and information was downloaded using the EndNote program developed by Thomson Reuters.
  
  
  RESULTS
  During the study period, a total of 6,964 references (articles, reviews, editorials, letter to the editor, etc.) covering different aspects of Giardia and giardiasis were located in the PubMed database after applying the search strategy reported above. Most papers were original articles and published in English.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  In this first effort to explore the development and research productivity on giardiasis over time (no previously published bibliometric studies on giardiasis exist), two interesting characteristics of the Giardia and giardiasis literature were discovered: the concentration of papers over journals disseminating the research results, and that research in this field is growing and will likely continue to grow in the coming years.
authors.affiliation: Academic Paediatric Hospital "Pedro Borrás", Havana, Cuba. escobedo@infomed.sld.cu.
authors.forename: Angel A
authors.initials: AA
authors.lastname: Escobedo
authors.forename: Ricardo
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Arencibia
authors.forename: Rosa L
authors.initials: RL
authors.lastname: Vega
authors.forename: Alfonso J
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Rodríguez-Morales
authors.forename: Pedro
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Almirall
authors.forename: Maydel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Alfonso
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000818:Animals; D015706:Bibliometrics; D035843:Biomedical Research / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005873:Giardiasis / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000517:prevention & control*; D014943:Global Health; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D008875:Middle Aged; D055815:Young Adult