bims-evares Biomed News
on Evaluation of research
Issue of 2026–04–19
twenty-one papers selected by
Thomas Krichel, Open Library Society
  1. Reply to "Editorial Comment on "Quantifying Research Productivity in the 2024-2025 Urology Residency Match: A Bibliometric Analysis of Verified Publication Rates"".
  2. Research productivity of ophthalmology residents in Saudi Arabia: A comprehensive analysis.
  3. Re: Research productivity of ophthalmology residents in Saudi Arabia: A comprehensive analysis.
  4. Current Trends in Pre-Residency Research Productivity Among Applicants Who Successfully Matched Into Top Anesthesiology Residency Programs.
  5. Collaboration between The National Dental Practice-Based Research Network and the American Association of Endodontists: Impact on the endodontic literature.
  6. Retracted Randomized Clinical Trials From Superretractors and Top-Cited Scientists With Multiple Retractions.
  7. Non-dissemination in qualitative health research-A retrospective cohort study of conference abstracts.
  8. Association of the Change in USMLE Step 1 Scoring With Research Output Among Applicants to Anesthesiology Residency Programs: A Retrospective Observational Study.
  9. National-, Institutional-, and Individual-Level Determinants of Neurology & Neurosurgery Research Excellence: An Analysis of Stanford-Elsevier Lists of the Top 2% Scholars Worldwide (2017-2023).
  10. Chagas disease and amiodarone: a bibliometric and systematic review from cell to patient.
  11. Confounding by gender and academic year masks null effects of a Cooperative Training Community framework on undergraduate research outcomes: a mixed-methods study.
  12. Predicting scientific breakthroughs through capacity-based dynamics in citation networks.
  13. Re: A response to: Letter to the editor regarding research productivity of ophthalmology residents in Saudi Arabia: A comprehensive analysis.
  14. The institutional dynamics of inequality for women inventors who break with conventional thinking.
  15. China discontinues prominent journal ranking list.
  16. Scalpel and salary: Gender pay disparities in academic medicine, 2013-2023.
  17. Beyond Tokenism: Making Lived Experience Leadership Visible in Co-Produced Research Authorship.
  18. Fragile research systems, brain drain, and predatory publishing in under-resourced countries.
  19. Letter to the Editor Regarding: "The Status of Women in Academic Medicine, and Particularly in Neurosurgery, in a Developing Country, Türkiye".
  20. The Role of Research Funders in Promoting Ethical International Health Research Collaborations.
  21. Box-enhanced context fusion for citation intent classification.
  1. Urology. 2026 Apr 10. pii: S0090-4295(26)00239-6. [Epub ahead of print]
    Reply to "Editorial Comment on "Quantifying Research Productivity in the 2024-2025 Urology Residency Match: A Bibliometric Analysis of Verified Publication Rates"".
    Arthur Yu, Adrian Bozocea, Martha K Terris.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.urology.2026.04.014
  2. Saudi J Ophthalmol. 2026 Jan-Mar;40(1):40(1): 37-41
    Research productivity of ophthalmology residents in Saudi Arabia: A comprehensive analysis.
    Waleed K Alsarhani, Yahya Alyahya, Abeer A Alkhodier, Ahmed S Al Zomia, Raed Alnutaifi, Motazz A Alarfaj, Rahaf M Al Malawi, Hind M Alkatan.
       PURPOSE: The purpose of the study was to assess the research productivity of ophthalmology residents in Saudi Arabia and identify factors associated with significant research output.
    METHODS: This is a cross-sectional study of ophthalmology training programs across Saudi Arabia from 2015 to 2019.
    RESULTS: The study included 225 ophthalmology residents, with a mean number of publications of 3.25 ± 4.59 and an average h-index of 1.20 ± 1.38. Statistically significant differences were observed between training programs in the mean number of publications (P < 0.001), h-index (P < 0.001), and citations (P < 0.001). The programs with the highest mean publication counts were King Saud University (8.03 ± 8.00), King Khaled Eye Specialist Hospital (3.80 ± 3.87), and the Eastern program (3.07 ± 4.04). Residents pursuing subspecialty fellowships, particularly in oculoplastic surgery and cornea, exhibited higher research output. Furthermore, the mean number of publications (P < 0.001), citations (P < 0.001), and h-index (P < 0.001) were associated with attaining future academic positions. Pursuing fellowship was significantly linked to the number of publications (P = 0.009) and h-index (P = 0.012).
    CONCLUSION: This study underscores the variability in research productivity among ophthalmology residents and highlights the influence of training programs, fellowship ambitions, and academic aspirations on research output.
    Keywords:  Academic ophthalmology; h-index; ophthalmology residents; research; training
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.4103/sjopt.sjopt_52_25
  3. Saudi J Ophthalmol. 2026 Jan-Mar;40(1):40(1): 103-104
    Re: Research productivity of ophthalmology residents in Saudi Arabia: A comprehensive analysis.
    Fayiqa A Bahkir.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.4103/sjopt.sjopt_323_25
  4. J Educ Perioper Med. 2026 Jan-Mar;28(1):28(1): E766
    Current Trends in Pre-Residency Research Productivity Among Applicants Who Successfully Matched Into Top Anesthesiology Residency Programs.
    Sharwani Kota, Nivetha Srinivasan, Colette B Gazonas, Dhiraj Sibala, Damanveer Singh, George A Popa, Jean D Eloy.
       Background: Anesthesiology has become increasingly competitive with 3172 applicants for 1992 positions in the 2025 Match. While selection is holistic, research remains a key factor. Current Match data lacks detail on research output. This study analyzes temporal, gender, and geographic trends in publication volume among medical students who matched into the top 20 US anesthesiology programs.
    Methods: Using Doximity's rankings, we identified the top 20 anesthesiology programs. A total of 447 residents from the 2027 graduating class and 414 from the 2024 graduating class were able to be identified through program websites. Total, first author, second author, and anesthesiology-specific publications were collected using PubMed and Google Scholar. Gender, medical school region, and residency program region were also identified for analyses.
    Results: Class of 2027 residents had significantly more total (2.47 vs 1.22), first author (0.57 vs 0.29), and second author (0.59 vs 0.29) publications than those from the class of 2024 (P < .01). No difference was found in anesthesiology-specific publications (P = .27). Among 2027 residents analyzed, there were significantly higher first author publications among females than males (0.72 vs 0.44, P < .01), and there were no significant differences based on medical school region. There was a significant difference in the total number and first author publications based on the region of their matched residency program (P < .001) with significantly higher total publications in New England compared with the West North Central region (P < .001).
    Conclusion: Research productivity increased between the graduating cohorts of 2024 and 2027, reflecting a growing emphasis on research among applicants to top anesthesiology programs. These may inform future applicants preparing for the Match.
    Keywords:  Research output; anesthesiology residency; publications; research productivity
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.46374/VolXXVIII_Issue1_Srinivasan
  5. J Am Dent Assoc. 2026 Apr 17. pii: S0002-8177(26)00113-3. [Epub ahead of print]
    Collaboration between The National Dental Practice-Based Research Network and the American Association of Endodontists: Impact on the endodontic literature.
    National Dental Practice-Based Research Network Collaborative Group
       BACKGROUND: Over the past few decades, The National Dental Practice-Based Research Network (network) has engaged in multiple collaborations with professional organizations. The authors evaluated the impact of a long-standing collaboration between the network and the American Association of Endodontists.
    METHODS: The authors assessed the impact of articles resulting from research done in the network using the National Institutes of Health (NIH) iCite metrics.
    RESULTS: Over the past 3 funding cycles, 7 studies pertaining to endodontics were conducted. These studies have so far resulted in 22 published articles, 1 in press article, and 4 articles under review. The overall mean relative citation ratio for 18 articles for which iCite metrics were available was 1.72, indicating that the articles were cited 72% more often than typical NIH-funded articles after adjusting for field of publication and time since publication. Two articles were cited over the 90th NIH percentile. The mean Approximate Potential to Translate score for the 18 articles was 56.4%.
    CONCLUSIONS: These results from the network and the American Association of Endodontists showed that national-level collaborations between large organizations can result in impactful research that has immediate clinical relevance in everyday practice.
    PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS: The network facilitates research conducted in the real world of clinical practice and has positively affected the field of endodontics.
    Keywords:  National Dental PBRN; network; practice-based research
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.adaj.2026.01.020
  6. JAMA Netw Open. 2026 Apr 01. 9(4): e267424
    Retracted Randomized Clinical Trials From Superretractors and Top-Cited Scientists With Multiple Retractions.
    Chunwei Lyu, Minoo Matbouriahi, Florian Naudet, John P A Ioannidis, Ioana Alina Cristea.
       Importance: Multiple retractions from the same author often uncover issues affecting their entire work, such as having systematically altered or fabricated data.
    Objectives: To evaluate the contribution of authors with the most retractions (ie, superretractors) and top-cited scientists with multiple retractions to the retracted randomized clinical trial (RCT) literature.
    Design, Setting, and Participants: This retrospective cohort study linked an openly available cohort of retracted RCTs (VITALITY) to 3 lists of scientists: (1) superretractors, totaling most retractions in the Retraction Watch Leaderboard; (2) scientists in the top 100 000 or 2% of their subfield in terms of citations (ie, top-cited scientists) over their entire careers who accumulated 10 or more retractions not due to editor or publisher errors; and (3) top-cited scientists in the most recent year (ie, 2024) who accumulated 10 or more retractions not due to editor or publisher errors. The VITALITY cohort was updated up to November 2024. The 3 author lists were updated in August 2025.
    Main Outcomes and Measures: The main outcomes were authorship and the characteristics of retracted RCTs (publication and retraction year, time between publication and retraction, number of citations).
    Results: A total of 30 superretractors, 163 career-long top-cited scientists with 10 or more retractions, and 174 recent-year top-cited scientists with 10 or more retractions were included; 1330 retracted RCTs were included. Overall, 6 superretractors (20%), representing anesthesiology as well as endocrinology and metabolism, coauthored 290 retracted RCTs (22%); 18 career-long top-cited scientists with at least 10 retractions, representing 10 fields, coauthored 327 trials (25%), 275 (84%) of which were also coauthored by a superretractor; 7 single-year top-cited scientists with at least 10 retractions coauthored 50 retracted RCTs (4%), all of which were also included in the list of articles authored by career-long top-cited scientists with at least 10 retractions. Articles with superretractor authors vs not were published earlier (median [IQR], 2000 [1997-2005] vs 2020 [2014-2022]); retracted earlier (median [IQR], 2013 [2012-2019] vs 2023 [2018.5-2023]); had a longer lag between publication and retraction (median [IQR], 5111 [3560-6820] days vs 482 [330-1119] days); and accrued more citations (median [IQR], 21 [12-42] vs 5 [1-19]). In multivariable regression models, only time to retraction (β = 0.02; P < .001) was significantly and positively associated with total citations. Results were similar when comparing retracted articles from top-cited scientists with at least 10 retractions vs other articles.
    Conclusions and Relevance: In this cohort study of 1330 retracted RCTs, a small number of influential authors, often coauthors and concentrated across few fields of medicine, accounted for a significant proportion of retracted clinical trials.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2026.7424
  7. Res Synth Methods. 2026 Apr 14. 1-12
    Non-dissemination in qualitative health research-A retrospective cohort study of conference abstracts.
    Marwin Weber, Markus Toews, Waldemar Siemens, Andrew Booth, Simon Lewin, Heather Menzies Munthe-Kaas, Claire Glenton, Jane Noyes, Joerg J Meerpohl, Ingrid Toews.
      Dissemination bias can occur when qualitative research is published selectively, potentially reducing the confidence in qualitative evidence. This retrospective cohort study aims to quantify the extent of non-dissemination of qualitative health research by following 1,123 conference abstracts. The proportion of non-dissemination, the time to publication, as well as associations between author or study characteristics and full publication were examined. For 22.8% of these studies, no full publication could be identified within at least 6 and up to 8 years after their presentation. For those that were published, median time to publication was 11 months (95% CI 10 to 12). Studies from authors affiliated with institutions in Australia were more likely to be published than those from North America (OR 4.47; 95% CI 1.58 to 18.74). Oral presentations were more likely to be published than poster presentations (OR 3.40; 95% CI 1.57 to 8.20). Studies that used two qualitative data collection methods were more likely to be published than studies that used one qualitative method only (OR 1.53; 95% CI 1.01 to 2.38). Conference abstracts that reported no funding were less likely to be published than those which reported funding (OR 0.71; 95% CI 0.51 to 0.99). Publicly funded research was more likely to be published than privately funded research (OR 2.24; 95% CI 1.16 to 4.28). Given the considerable proportion of unpublished health-related qualitative studies, there is a reason to believe that dissemination bias may impact negatively on qualitative evidence synthesis. This can, in turn, impair decision-making that uses qualitative evidence.
    Keywords:  GRADE-CERQual; cohort study; dissemination bias; publication bias; qualitative evidence synthesis; qualitative research
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1017/rsm.2026.10085
  8. J Educ Perioper Med. 2026 Jan-Mar;28(1):28(1): E760
    Association of the Change in USMLE Step 1 Scoring With Research Output Among Applicants to Anesthesiology Residency Programs: A Retrospective Observational Study.
    Ashna Bhardwaj, Pratima Bajaj, Karim Rifai, Akshar Patel, Arjun Bhatt, Ali Abolhassani, Jack McClain, Asim Ahmed, Caryl Bailey, Mary Arthur.
       Background: As anesthesiology residency becomes increasingly competitive, the transition of US Medical Licensing Examination (USMLE) Step 1 to pass/fail scoring has raised questions about the evolving role of research in applicant selection. Whereas national data suggests rising research engagement, there are limited insights into publication output among medical students applying into anesthesiology. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the relationship between the USMLE Step 1 transition and preresidency publication output of matched anesthesiology residents and to assess the role medical school National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding level has on publication metrics.
    Methods: This retrospective cohort study analyzed the research output of 461 anesthesiology residents across 30 programs from the classes of 2026 (numerical Step 1 scoring) and 2028 (pass/fail Step 1 scoring). Medical schools were stratified by NIH funding level to evaluate its association with research output. PubMed-indexed publications were examined using metrics including first author status, specialty relevance, citation counts, and publication types. Using Mann-Whitney U tests, group differences were compared with total publications serving as the primary outcome.
    Results: There were no significant differences in research output between pre- and post-Step 1 transition cohorts across all metrics. The 50th percentile in total publications was 0 for both cohorts. There was also no difference in publication output when groups were stratified by NIH funding level. Logistic regression analysis showed that high NIH funding (odds ratio 1.87, 95% confidence interval 1.21-2.89) was a significant predictor of having at least 1 publication.
    Conclusions: Despite increasing emphasis on research in residency applications, our findings show no significant change in publication output among anesthesiology applicants in the first class following the Step 1 transition. Whereas NIH funding level was associated with a greater likelihood of having at least 1 publication, it was not linked to higher overall publication output. This study provides a timely baseline for understanding scholarly activity in anesthesiology applicants as the residency evaluation landscape continues to evolve.
    Keywords:  Anesthesiology residency; US Medical Licensing Examination; medical school; research productivity
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.46374/VolXXVIII_Issue1_Bhardwaj
  9. Neuroepidemiology. 2026 Apr 14. 1-46
    National-, Institutional-, and Individual-Level Determinants of Neurology &amp; Neurosurgery Research Excellence: An Analysis of Stanford-Elsevier Lists of the Top 2% Scholars Worldwide (2017-2023).
    Abanoub Riad, Michal Koščík.
      Background Neurologic research output is extensive, yet influential contributions remain unevenly distributed across countries and institutions. Prior studies have emphasised productivity rather than excellence, limiting understanding of where high-impact neurologic scholarship is concentrated and which structural conditions may support its development. Methods Seven annual releases (2017-2023) of the Stanford-Elsevier Lists (SEL) were analyzed between July and August 2025, and Excellent Neurologic Scholars (ENS) were extracted from the career-long and single-year SEL datasets of each release. A multilevel ecological framework was used to examine national, institutional, and individual determinants of neurologic research excellence. The main outcome measures were ENS counts, composite score (c-score), modified H-index, and citation count excluding self-citations. Results A total of 142,457 ENS records were analyzed, with 55.2% from the career-long SEL and 44.8% from the single-year SEL. High-income countries accounted for 97.8% and 95.8% of ENS, respectively, with the US alone contributing nearly half (50.1% and 47.1%). English-speaking countries collectively represented over two-thirds of ENS, while German ranked a distant second (~9%). The top 20 institutions hosted 23.1% and 24.1% of ENS, with the University of California (4.5% and 4.4%) leading, underscoring marked institutional elitism. Gender disparities were evident: women comprised 18.3% of ENS in the career-long SEL and 22.4% in the single-year SEL, with males consistently achieving higher bibliometric indicators. Academic age emerged as the only stable predictor of excellence, with each additional year increasing citation counts (β = 135.1 and 2.4). Regression analyses confirmed independent effects of male gender, English language, income level, and HDI, while attenuating bivariate associations. Conclusion Neurologic research excellence is disproportionately concentrated in high-income, Anglophone settings and elite institutions, with persistent gender gaps. Academic age remained the strongest predictor, underscoring the need for more context-sensitive and equitable policies to support neurologic scholarship across diverse settings.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1159/000551993
  10. Front Pharmacol. 2026 ;17 1749345
    Chagas disease and amiodarone: a bibliometric and systematic review from cell to patient.
    Juliana Magalhães Chaves Barbosa, Raquel Barreto Duarte, Henrique Horta Veloso, Anissa Daliry, Kelly Salomão.
       Background: Chagas disease (CD) is a neglected tropical illness caused by Trypanosoma cruzi, with a high prevalence in Latin America. Arrhythmias are common in patients with Chagas cardiomyopathy, and amiodarone (AMIO) has been widely used in their management. Recent studies have also suggested a potential role for AMIO as a trypanocidal agent. This review aims to evaluate the current evidence regarding AMIO therapy for the treatment of patients with CD.
    Methodology: This study combines bibliometric and systematic review approaches to explore the use of AMIO in the treatment of CD. The literature search was conducted in PubMed. Bibliometric analyses were performed using the Bibliometrix 2.2.1 package in R 3.6 (R Core Team, 2019). Relationship mapping was carried out using VOSviewer 1.6.16 (https://www.vosviewer.com/) to visualize bibliographic network structures. The systematic review component followed the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews (PRISMA) guidelines.
    Principal Findings: A total of 52 original articles published in 35 journals were included, involving contributions from 269 authors, predominantly from Latin America. Brazil was the leading contributor, followed by Venezuela, the United States, Argentina, and Spain. The bibliometric analysis identified several emerging trends: (1) treatment outcomes such as mortality and hospitalization; (2) the antiarrhythmic effects of AMIO; (3) potential trypanocidal effects of AMIO; (4) the use of AMIO in combination with other drugs for etiological treatment; and (5) its possible anti-inflammatory effects.
    Conclusion: This review highlights a significant gap in literature, specifically the lack of rigorous clinical studies evaluating the impact of AMIO in patients with chronic Chagas cardiomyopathy (CCC). Additionally, we identify promising avenues for future research to better understand AMIO's therapeutic role in the management of CD.
    Keywords:  Chagas disease; Trypanosoma cruzi; amiodarone; bibliometric and systematic review; cardiomyopathy
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.3389/fphar.2026.1749345
  11. BMC Med Educ. 2026 Apr 16.
    Confounding by gender and academic year masks null effects of a Cooperative Training Community framework on undergraduate research outcomes: a mixed-methods study.
    Yongxiang Yuan, Anji Ren, Kai Huang, Shuang Zhao, Xiang Chen.
      
    Keywords:  Confounding factors; Research productivity; Selection bias; Self-efficacy; Tiered mentorship; Undergraduate medical education
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-026-09194-8
  12. Phys Rev E. 2026 Mar;113(3-1): 034315
    Predicting scientific breakthroughs through capacity-based dynamics in citation networks.
    Jiazhen Liu, Kunal Tamang, Dashun Wang, Chaoming Song.
      Scientific impact emerges from citation networks shaped by nonlinear and out-of-equilibrium dynamics. By analyzing over 30 million scientific papers and 1 billion references across disciplines, we uncover a two-phase correlation structure: a long-term assortative regime, where highly cited works reinforce each other, and a short-term antiassortative regime, where transformative papers tend to draw upon under-recognized ideas. To reconcile this paradox, we introduce a single state variable-capacity-which quantifies the residual "originality budget" of prior knowledge. We demonstrate that capacity governs a universal double-exponential relationship with long-term impact, consistent across biology, chemistry, and physics. Building on this empirical regularity, we formulate a stochastic dynamical model coupling novelty erosion with capacity-driven attachment. The model accurately reproduces the observed dual-phase correlations and predicts a critical capacity that maximizes future impact. Furthermore, we show that capacity serves as a robust early indicator of scientific breakthroughs, effectively distinguishing Nobel-Prize-winning papers from the rest. Our results provide a unified theoretical framework for correlated impact dynamics, advancing our understanding of knowledge diffusion and breakthrough emergence in complex evolving networks.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1103/7bs5-8ql3
  13. Saudi J Ophthalmol. 2026 Jan-Mar;40(1):40(1): 105
    Re: A response to: Letter to the editor regarding research productivity of ophthalmology residents in Saudi Arabia: A comprehensive analysis.
    Waleed K Alsarhani, Yahya Alyahya, Abeer Abdulghani Alkhodier, Ahmed Saad Al Zomia, Raed Alnutaifi, Motazz Alarfaj, Rahaf M Al Malawi, Hind M Alkatan.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.4103/sjopt.sjopt_351_25
  14. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2026 Apr 21. 123(16): e2500343123
    The institutional dynamics of inequality for women inventors who break with conventional thinking.
    Tara Sowrirajan, Ryan Whalen, Brian Uzzi.
      Though women comprise a growing share of the scientific workforce, the gender innovation gap in patenting between men and women inventors persists, potentially limiting innovation output and equity. We study millions of scientific and technological innovations and find that the innovation gap faced by women is not universal. No gap exists for highly conventional innovations, which combine ideas in familiar ways. Rather, it exists when women inventors attempt to patent unconventional inventions, which combine ideas in surprising ways and drive scientific advancements. Our data suggest that rather than deliberate bias, a confluence of institutional practices lower women inventor's chances of patenting unconventional innovations. We find that women examiners relative to men have less of the on-the-job experience needed to appraise unconventional innovations. Additionally, women examiners are overassigned to women applicants, reducing their odds of successfully patenting unconventional inventions. Lastly, traditional explanations weakly account for this innovation gap because men examiners grant comparably more unconventional innovations to women inventors than do women examiners. These institutional barriers reveal new factors that slow innovation, but at the same time can be more directly addressed than deeply rooted gender norms.
    Keywords:  gender innovation gap; innovation; science of science; scientific equity
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2500343123
  15. Nature. 2026 Apr;652(8110): 828
    China discontinues prominent journal ranking list.
    Zheng Liu.
      
    Keywords:  Policy; Research management; Scientific community
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-026-01216-1
  16. Am J Surg. 2026 Apr 02. pii: S0002-9610(26)00148-0. [Epub ahead of print] 116965
    Scalpel and salary: Gender pay disparities in academic medicine, 2013-2023.
    Amelia A Trant, Alexa Wolfe, Jessica K Lee.
       OBJECTIVE: To characterize trends and specialty-specific variation in gender-based salary disparities.
    DESIGN: Secondary analysis of Association of American Medical Colleges Faculty Salary Reports from 2013 to 2023 using descriptive and nonparametric methods to assess gender distribution, leadership representation, and salary differences across specialties.
    SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS: The 2013 cohort included 63,463 full-time faculty (34% women); the 2023 cohort included 88,646 faculty (43% women).
    RESULTS: Pay gaps narrowed between 2013 and 2023 but persisted across specialties and ranks. Women's representation increased across specialties and leadership. Pay gaps varied by specialty, with larger disparities in surgical fields. Median pay gaps were significantly greater in surgical versus non-surgical specialties in 2013 (35.0% vs 21.0%; p = 0.020) and 2023 (32.0%vs 18.4%; p = 0.028). No association was identified between female workforce or leadership representation and pay gaps.
    CONCLUSIONS: Gender pay inequities persist, particularly in surgical specialties, suggesting ongoing structural and specialty-specific drivers.
    Keywords:  Academic medicine; Female leadership; Gender pay gap; Physician compensation; Women in surgery
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amjsurg.2026.116965
  17. Health Expect. 2026 Apr;29(2): e70665
    Beyond Tokenism: Making Lived Experience Leadership Visible in Co-Produced Research Authorship.
    Patte Randal, Stefan Heinz.
       BACKGROUND: Co-production research values the lived/living experience (LE) of people navigating health challenges. Despite this, traditional academic authorship often disregards power dynamics that participatory research seeks to address.
    MAIN BODY: This critical reflection argues for centring LE collaborators as first authors in co-production research. We analyse authorship through Foucauldian power/knowledge dynamics, Derrida's deconstructive ethics and Levinasian ethics of responsibility, drawing on Critchley's synthesis of these traditions. This multiple lens reveals a tension: co-production research requires political solidarity ('us') to challenge epistemic injustice, yet demands ethical vigilance to preserve individual voices. The concept of porous solidarity is useful here. Acknowledging the value of experience-based expertise by means of first authorship embodies this framework: it redistributes epistemic authority and shifts research from studies about populations to studies by/with those populations.
    CONCLUSIONS: First author placement of experience-based experts where appropriate, plus explicit acknowledgement of all researchers' relevant LE where freely given, offers both an ethically responsive approach and a practical strategy for aligning co-production processes with publication practices. By centring LE collaborators as first authors and acknowledging the LE of academic researchers, co-production research teams can embody the principle rooted in disability activism, of 'nothing about us without us-leading' in academic literature. This supports epistemic justice, creates solidarity and builds capacity within communities conducting research.
    PATIENT OR PUBLIC CONTRIBUTION: This lived experience-led article was co-produced by two researchers with lived experience. Experiential expertise shaped the conception, argument development, drafting and critical revision of the manuscript and the practical implications presented.
    Keywords:  authorship; co‐production; epistemic injustice; epistemic justice; ethics; lived experience; porous solidarity; power
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/hex.70665
  18. Microlife. 2026 ;7 uqag011
    Fragile research systems, brain drain, and predatory publishing in under-resourced countries.
    Stipan Jonjić, Zeynep Ceren Karahan, Puri Lopez-Garcia, Paul Williams, Ani Gerbin, Luka Traven, Kenneth N Timmis, Paul B Rainey.
      Many countries with lower research & innovation capacity face persistent constraints in building stable research systems. Chronic underfunding and weak science policy reduce institutional capacity and limit researchers' career prospects. These conditions encourage brain drain, particularly among early-career scientists who seek predictable funding, transparent evaluation, and merit-based advancement. As a result, research institutions lose skilled personnel, which weakens scientific training, governance, and research output. Additionally, within this environment, predatory publishing practices create further damage. These scientific outlets reward volume over quality, thus distorting evaluation criteria. They promote negative selection by favouring speed of publication at the expense of rigorous peer review. Over time, this weakens academic standards and undermines trust in the research output. The result is a decline in scientific credibility and an overall reduction in international competitiveness. Although predatory publishing is motivated by financial gain, it results in serious institutional consequences. It directly reshapes hiring, promotion, and funding decisions in ways that disadvantage high-quality research. This contributes to the erosion of both research integrity and academic communities.
    Keywords:  EU widening countries; brain-drain; fragile research systems; predatory publishing practice; research culture
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1093/femsml/uqag011
  19. World Neurosurg. 2026 Apr 11. pii: S1878-8750(26)00202-0. [Epub ahead of print] 124986
    Letter to the Editor Regarding: "The Status of Women in Academic Medicine, and Particularly in Neurosurgery, in a Developing Country, Türkiye".
    Inês Filipa Da Silva, Chandrasekaran Kaliaperumal.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wneu.2026.124986
  20. Dev World Bioeth. 2026 Apr 16.
    The Role of Research Funders in Promoting Ethical International Health Research Collaborations.
    George Kwasi Barimah, Charles F Hayfron-Benjamin, Bennett Allen, Kyle Ferguson, Amos Laar.
       BACKGROUND: International health research collaborations (IHRCs) between High Income countries (HICs) and Low-and Middle-Income Countries (LMICs) are essential in global health research, yet ethical challenges including the inequitable sharing of rewards and burdens among the research actors remain insufficiently addressed. We explored the notices of funding opportunities and official guidance documents of three major research funders to assess how funding agencies structure and promote the ethical conduct of IHRCs.
    METHODS: We conducted a content analysis of publicly available notices of funding opportunities and official guidance documents from the National Institutes of Health, European Commission, and Wellcome Trust. Using a structured data collection instrument, we cataloged content within the notices related to equitable data sharing, scientific capacity development, authorship, and intellectual property ownership.
    RESULTS: We reviewed 21 International Health Research Collaboration (IHRC)-related documents issued between 2017 and 2021. Documents reviewed included funding opportunity announcements, grant compliance documents, and funders' code of ethics. While all three funders had general provisions for data sharing, none had guidelines specific to data management within IHRC context including the potential use of data for secondary purposes without the prior consent of researchers in LMICs. Although all funders had general guidelines on the ownership of results, guidelines specifying the distribution of ownership rights among HIC and LMIC collaborators were absent. Specific guidelines on how researchers in LMICs and HICs would benefit from each other's expertise as well as authorship guidelines within the IHRC context were absent from all funder's notices of funding opportunities.
    CONCLUSIONS: Guidelines that promote ethical conduct of IHRCs were absent from documents reviewed from the three top funders of global health research. Development and inclusion of such guidelines in funding announcements could promote ethical IHRCs.
    Keywords:  HIC; International Research Collaborations; LMIC; research ethics; research funders
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/dewb.70026
  21. Neural Netw. 2026 Apr 08. pii: S0893-6080(26)00423-5. [Epub ahead of print]201 108962
    Box-enhanced context fusion for citation intent classification.
    Jinwen Yang, Zhijuan Du.
      Citation intent classification is a core research topic in scientometrics and information retrieval. This task analyzes citation contexts and relationships to categorize citation behaviors such as providing support, making comparisons, or offering contextual background. Identifying these behaviors helps reveal the specific role of citations in scholarly communication and clarifies the underlying authorial intent. Existing text-encoding approaches typically formulate citation intent classification as a conventional text classification task. However, this formulation overlooks two critical factors: the influence of citation marker position on classification performance and the implicit hierarchical relationships among texts within the same class.To address these limitations, we propose GLB-Cite, a novel citation intent classification model that fuses local citation marker information with a global context representation to obtain a unified fused representation. This representation is then projected into two parallel spaces: a vector embedding space for semantic discrimination and a box embedding space for modeling overlap between citation contexts and intent classes. By jointly optimizing these two branches, GLB-Cite balances semantic expressiveness and geometric boundary modeling, yielding notable gains especially for intent classes with overlapping semantics and ambiguous decision boundaries.We evaluate the performance of GLB-Cite on two public datasets, SciCite and ACL-ARC, using the macro-F1 score as the primary evaluation metric.Experimental results show that GLB-Cite achieves state-of-the-art performance, with F1 scores of 87.69% on SciCite and 79.79% on ACL-ARC.
    Keywords:  Citation intent classification; Citation marker position; Context fusion; Geometry-aware; Global context representation; Joint optimization
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neunet.2026.108962
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