Asthma in children: mapping the literature by bibliometric analysis

Aim. – To evaluate the publication output associated with research on asthma in children.

Methods. – The data encompassed the period from 1991 to 2002 and were extracted from the Science Citation Index online version. Selected documents included ‘asthmatic children’ and ‘asthma children’ as a part of its title, abstract, or keyword from. Parameters analyzed included language, type of document, page count, publication output, country of publication, authorship, publication pattern, and the most frequently cited paper.

Results. – The yearly publications have increased from 1991 to 2002. The seven industrialized countries have high productivity in this research field. English was the dominant language, and four or five authors were the moot common number of co-author. The US was the world leader and dominated most of the publications, followed by the UK.

Conclusions. – The most important functions of scientific publications are to communicate and exchange research findings and results. The results of the study not only offer a comprehensive picture of asthma in children by bibliometric research, but also demonstrate the performance of research workers, institutions, and even countries.