SPECIAL TOPICS

Diabetes

Published: May 2009

The baseline time span for this database is (publication years) 1999-February 28, 2009 from the first bimonthly update (a 10-year + 2-month period). The resulting database contained 50,145 (10 years) and 14,506 (2 years) papers; 117,289 authors; 150 nations; 2,937 journals; and 22,269 institutions.

OVERVIEW

Medical specialists and public-health officials continue to be concerned about the global growth of diabetes. The World Health Organization estimates that 366 million people will be diagnosed with diabetes by the year 2030. According to the American Diabetes Association, at present, 23.6 million, or 7.8% of the population of the US has diabetes, but only 17.9 million of those cases have actually been diagnosed. The International Diabetes Federation states that diabetes is the fourth leading cause of death globally.

This month, ScienceWatch.com examines the literature on diabetes over the past decade and over the past two years to see what has changed and what new advances are being cited since the last time Special Topics focused on diabetes in 2002.

The 10-year list encompasses a wide variety of topics, including lifestyle interventions for the prevention of diabetes, cardiovascular morbidity in diabetic patients, the effects of angiotensin-receptor antagonists such as losartan and irbesartan in patients with type 2 diabetes and nephropathy, the role of proteins like adiponectin and resistin in diabetes, and the prevalence of obesity, diabetes, and obesity-related disorders. The results of named trials such as the HOPE and MICRO-HOPE studies are shared.

The prevalent trend in the two-year list is the genetics of diabetes—there are seven papers reporting on genome-wide association studies, and two additional papers looking at very specific genes. The effects of cardiovascular drugs in diabetic patients are also still a concern; the results of the ADVANCE trial are among the papers reporting on this topic. Drug trials centered on the antidiabetic drugs pioglitazone, sitagliptin, glipizide, vildagliptin, and rosiglitazone are also discussed.

Methodology: The baseline time span for this database is (publication years) 1999-February 28, 2009 from the first bimonthly update (a 10-year + 2-month period). The resulting database contained 50,145 (10 years) and 14,506 (2 years) papers; 117,289 authors; 150 nations; 2,937 journals; and 22,269 institutions.

Rankings: Once the database was in place, it was used to generate list of authors, journals, institutions, and nations. Rankings for author, journal, institution, and country are listed in three ways: according to total cites, total papers, and total cites/paper. The paper thresholds and corresponding percentages used to determine scientist, institution, country, and journal rankings according to total cites/paper, and total papers respectively are as follows: