JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

The two main general categories of surveillance include indicator-based surveillance and event or case-based surveillance. However, new and novel approaches in surveillance are in a constant state of high and immediate demand to tackle unexpected health challenges in a timely manner directly, and address community health concerns. Bibliometric analysis of scientific literature on surveillance helps foster an understanding of the scientific development and thus potentially supports future development directions.

Objective:

To illustrate the scientific production, quantify the scholarly impact, and highlight the characteristics of publications on public health surveillance (PHS) in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR) over the last decade.

Methods:

We performed a Scopus search using keywords relating to PHS or its disciplines, cross referenced with EMR countries, from 2011-July 2021. Data were exported and analyzed using Microsoft Excel and VOSviewer. Quality of Journals was determined using SCImago journal rank.

Results:

We retrieved 1,987 documents, of which 97% were articles or reviews. There was an incremental increase in the number of publications (exponential growth, R2=0.80) over the last decade. Publications were mostly affiliated with Iran (N=501, 25%), United States (N=468, 24%), Pakistan (N=243, 12%), Egypt (N=224, 11%) and Saudi Arabia (N=209, 11%). However, Iran only had links with 40 other countries (total link strength 164) and the biggest collaborator from the EMR was Egypt, with 67 links (total link strength 402). Within the other EMR countries, only Morocco, Lebanon, and Jordan produced ≥79 publications in the 10-year period. Most publications (N=1,551, 78%), were affiliated with EMR universities. Most Journals were categorized as medical journals, and the Eastern Mediterranean Health Journal (SJR 0.442) published the most. Retrieved documents had an average of 18.4 citations/document, and an h-index of 66. The top three most cited documents were from the Global Burden of Diseases study. We found 70 high frequency terms, occurring ≥10 times in author keywords, connected in three cluster. COVID-19, SARS-COV-2 and pandemic represent the most recent 2020 cluster.

Conclusions:

This is the first study to scholarly quantify the published literature on PHS and its disciplines in the EMR. It provides an analysis of the scientific research, with evidence-based descriptions and visualizations of research output, also shedding light on the gaps in research.