Document Type : Original Article
Authors
1 Associate Professor in Library and Information Sciences, Shiraz University, Shiraz
2 Information and Knowledge Sciences, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran
Abstract
Introduction: The issues of patient rights have recently been entered into medical and legal realms and
have attracted the attention of scholars. This field, which is in early stages of development, requires
studying the patterns and characteristics of its scientific production and its compatibility with the global
norms of the worlds’ sciences. The present study aimed to investigate the scientific productivity and its
impact patterns on patient rights during 1990-2010. Hence, it endeavors to discover their growth trend,
local and global impact, the most productive contributing countries, authors and journals, document types,
dominant languages, highly cited authors, and finally Iran's share. It may help to reflect the progress of
knowledge and its patterns and also highlight the weaknesses and strengths, and thereby be useful in
managing and planning research and development in this field.
Methods: The present study applied a survey method with a scientometrics approach. All the scientific
productions indexed by the Thomson Reuters database during 1990-2010 constituted the study materials.
A total number of 1236 records were extracted. The data were analyzed through Excel and Thomson
Reuters HistCite software, using descriptive and analytical statistics including frequency, percentage,
Spearman correlation, and linear, power and exponential regressions analysis.
Results: The maximum scientific output production in this field has been published during 2006-2010. They
showed an increasing trend on an exponential basis, illustrating the sustainability of scientific production in
this field. However, the citation number did not show a significant growth. This could be resulted from the
small size of this field and its related domains. The total global impact was lower than the total local impact
implying that the papers were rather an inspiration source for other related fields than an intra-field source.
Authorship pattern adhered to Lotka's law in that the number of authors decreased as their publications
increase on a power basis. However, the exponent equation is higher than two. The global distribution of the
papers and their language variations signified the world's concerns for patient rights.
Conclusion: The patient rights exhibits many similarities to scientific fields and its publication foundation
is being established and stabilized: the exponential growth of the papers, their language and document
variation, global distribution, and specially its research nature indicated the development of this field as a
research realm.
Keywords
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