Assessing Scholarly Impact of Case Reports in the Journal of the Academy of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry

Background: Scholarship in academic medicine has shifted away from publishing case reports (CRs). However, CR publication may have utility in medical training (Florek, 2016; Ortega-Loubon, 2017). Within consult-liaison psychiatry, CRs continue to be published in each issue of the Journal of the Academy of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry (JACLP). Here, we seek to better understand the characteristics of CRs published in JACLP and assess available metrics of each CR to understand their scholarly impact.

Methods: Two authors (TBS,RNS) reviewed all CRs in JACLP from 2012-2016. Extracted metrics included number of cases, authors, references, inclusion of literature review, sex of first author, number of CR citations in three years following publication, and number of publications by CR-first-author three years following publication. Each CR was then categorized: (1) new manifestation of psychiatric phenomenon, (2) psychiatric complication from a medical treatment, (3) medical complication from psychiatric treatment, (4) new approach to treatment of a psychiatric problem, or (5) legal/ethical issues.

Results: We reviewed 149 CRs from 98 institutions. CRs reported an average 1.28 cases (SD=.871), 3.72 authors (SD=1.58), 19.65 references (SD=9.0), 3.10 citations in three years following publications (SD=6.17; range:0-72) and the first author averaged 5.55 publications in three years following the CR (SD=11.97; range:0-91). These last two categories served as dependent variables to investigate scholarly impact. 53.7% (N=80) did not include a literature review and 55% (N=82) of first authors were men. The most common category was a new manifestation of a psychiatric phenomenon (34.9%); with legal/ethical issues the least (4.7%). The only metric associated with greater CR citations was whether the article reported more than one case (M= 3.86; SD=2.44) versus one (M= 2.43; SD=2.37).

Discussion/Conclusion: There is a variety of CRs published in the JACLP. Few CR metrics were related to subsequent citations or eventual publications from the first author with the exception of more than one case description being associated with more citations. These findings highlight the heterogeneity of CRs in JACLP, that additional cases are related to more citations, and that more work is needed to determine CRs scholarly impact.

1. Florek, A. and Dellavalle, R. Case reports in medical education: a platform for training medical students, residents, and fellows in scientific writing and critical thinking. Journal of Medical Case Reports 2016; 10:86

2. Ortega-Loubon, C., Culquichicon, C., and Correa, R. The Importance of Writing and Publishing Case Reports During Medical Training. Cureus 2017; 9(12): e1964