Document Type
Journal Article
Publication Title
BMJ Open Sport and Exercise Medicine
Volume
9
Issue
1
Publisher
BMJ Publishing Group
School
School of Medical and Health Sciences
RAS ID
54621
Funders
Olympic Committee Medical and Scientific Commission awarded to CFF, LVF, WD, CE, KP, MS and EV / Research Centre for the Prevention of Injury and Illness
Abstract
Background: Research evidence is commonly compiled into expert-agreed consensus statements or guidelines, with an increasing trend towards their publication in peer-reviewed journals. Prominent among these has been the publication of several International Olympic Committee (IOC) tatements to help inform sport and exercise medicine (SEM) practice. This study aimed to assess the citation impact and reach of the IOC statements published between 2003 and 2020. Method: Bibliometric analysis focused on identifying core publications (original statement and linked publications) and quantifying their academic citations (number and Field-Weighted Citation Impact (FWCI)) in journal articles up to February 2022. The analysis includes descriptive data on the country of IOC statement authorship affiliations, where they were published and by whom. The extent to which the IOC statements have been cited in the peer-reviewed literature is presented, together with information about the country of authorship of the citing papers as a measure of international academic reach. Results: 29 IOC statements were composed of 61 core publications. The IOC statements have had 9535 citations from 7863 citing publications. Individual FWCI ranged from 1.2 to 24.3 for core publications. The IOC statements were coauthored by multiple authors, mostly affiliated to countries with well-resourced SEM Authors of citing publications reflected the same geographical regions (ie, the USA, Canada, Australia, UK and western Europe.) Conclusion: Disseminating the IOC statements as open access papers in peer-reviewed journals has resulted in strong citation impact. However, this impact is centred on well-resourced academic circles that may not represent the diversity of SEM. Further research is required to identify if, and to what extent, the IOC statements have impacted SEM practice worldwide.
DOI
10.1136/bmjsem-2022-001460
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 License
Comments
Fortington, L. V., Handcock, R. N., Derman, W., Emery, C. A., Pasanen, K., Schwellnus, M., ... & Finch C. F. (2023). Citation impact and reach of the IOC sport and exercise medicine consensus statements. BMJ Open Sport & Exercise Medicine, 9(1), Article e001460. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjsem-2022-001460