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Cardiovascular Research 2000 45(1):3-5; doi:10.1016/S0008-6363(99)00341-7
© 2000 by European Society of Cardiology
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Copyright © 2000, European Society of Cardiology

The most frequently cited papers of Cardiovascular Research (1967–1998)

‘The Millennium Minutes’

Tobias Opthof*, Ruben Coronel and on behalf of the Editorial Team

Department of Clinical and Experimental Cardiology, Academic Medical Center, Meibergdreef 9, P.O. Box 22700, 1105 AZ Amsterdam, The Netherlands

* Tel.: +31-20-566-3265; fax: +31-20-697-5458 t.opthof{at}amc.uva.nl


   1 Introduction
Top
 1 Introduction
2 Differences in citation...
 3 Selection of papers...
 References
 
The impact factor is supposed to reflect the scientific quality of a journal. However, this is not necessarily true for the individual papers published by a journal. The impact factor is based on citations obtained during the first two years after the year of publication. For cardiovascular journals it is known that the zenith in citations is reached after this period [1]. We analyzed the citations to all 3963 papers ever published by Cardiovascular Research.

Table 1 shows the most frequently cited papers since 1967, the first year of publication of Cardiovascular Research, ranked according to the total number of citations and according to the number of citations per year. Close to 100 papers were cited more than 100 times. The first position was taken by a paper from the group of Salvador Moncada dealing with nitric oxide (Wright et al., January 1992 issue; cited 388 times [2]). The second position was taken by a classic from Bramah Singh and colleagues (1972) on verapamil [3]. A paper by Sen et al. (1977) on hypertension took the third position [4].


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  		Table 1 Most frequently cited papers of Cardiovascular Research published since 1967a

 

   2 Differences in citation profile
Top
 1 Introduction
 2 Differences in citation...
3 Selection of papers...
 References
 
Fig. 1 shows the cumulative number of citations obtained by papers by Bristow et al. (1969) on cardiovascular changes during sleep [5] and Kjekshus et al. (1972) on changes in the electrocardiogram during ischemia [6]. The total number of citations obtained by the first paper was larger. Still, during the first years since publication the paper of Kjekshus et al. [6] was far more frequently cited. Fig. 2 shows completely different citation profiles of two other papers: one by Pelides et al. [7] on the effects of β-adrenoceptor blockade in acute ischemia and the other by Zimmerman et al. [8] on the calcium paradox. Moreover, the profile of the Zimmerman paper was delayed compared to the other paper by as much as 15 years. In fact, the paper by Zimmerman et al. [8] published in 1967 contributed little or nothing to the impact factor of Cardiovascular Research in 1968 or 1969, despite the fact that the paper collected 260 citations over the years (Table 1; rank 7). Observations like these underscore once more that impact factors do not indicate the scientific significance of individual papers [9] and that from the perspective of the impact factor journals only benefit from papers with early citations.


Figure 1
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  		Fig. 1 The cumulative number of citations of a paper by Bristow and colleagues on cardiovascular changes during sleep (Ref. [5]) published in 1969 and of a paper by Kjekshus and colleagues) on changes in the electrocardiogram during ischemia (Ref. [6]) published in 1972. Year 1 along the abscissa is 1969 respectively 1972 for the two papers. The paper of Bristow et al. obtained roughly a similar number of citations per year over 30 years, whereas the paper of Kjekshus et al. was more frequently cited during 15 years after publication, but hardly afterwards (i.e. after 1986).

 

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  		Fig. 2 The citations per year for two papers published by Zimmerman and colleagues on the calcium paradox (Ref. [8]) in 1967 and by Pelides et al. on the effects of β-adrenoceptor blockade in acute ischemia (Ref. [7]) in 1972. Year 1 along the abscissa indicates 1967 respectively 1972 for the two papers. Both papers showed a similar profile, however, citation of the Zimmerman paper was delayed by 10–15 years compared to the Pelides paper.

 

   3 Selection of papers for the ‘Millennium Minutes’
Top
 1 Introduction
 2 Differences in citation...
 3 Selection of papers...
References
 
We selected papers for this issue both on the basis of their total citations and their scientific category. We discriminated between papers on ‘methods’, ‘pharmacology’, ‘hypertension’, ‘ischemia/reperfusion’, ‘vascular aspects’ and ‘regulatory systems’, placing them in an unfavourable citation position. In addition, we chose papers from ‘past editors’ (John P. Shillingford [7], Peter Sleight [5] and David J. Hearse [10]). Finally, we selected an almost ‘forgotten’ [11] and a ‘promising’ paper [12]. In a concluding paper we pay attention to the fate of papers rejected by Cardiovascular Research during the years 1995 and 1996 in the category ‘Regrets or no regrets?’.


   References
Top
 1 Introduction
 2 Differences in citation...
 3 Selection of papers...
 References
 

  1. Moed H.F., Van Leeuwen Th.N., Reedijk J. A new classification system to describe the ageing of scientific journals and their impact factors. J Document (1998) 54:387–419.[CrossRef]
  2. Wright C.E., Rees D.D., Moncada S. Protective and pathological roles of nitric oxide in endotoxin shock. Cardiovasc Res (1992) 26:48–57.[Abstract/Free Full Text]
  3. Singh B.N., Vaughan Williams E.N. A fourth class of anti-dysrhythmic action? Effect of verapamil on ouabain toxicity, on atrial and ventricular intracellular potentials, and on other features of cardiac function. Cardiovasc Res (1972) 6:109–119.[Abstract/Free Full Text]
  4. Sen S., Tarazi R.C., Bumpus F.M. Cardiac hypertrophy and antihypertensive therapy. Cardiovasc Res (1977) 11:427–433.[Abstract/Free Full Text]
  5. Bristow J.D., Honour A.J., Pickering T.G., Sleight P. Cardiovascular and respiratory changes during sleep in normal and hypertensive patients. Cardiovasc Res (1969) 3:476–485.[Abstract/Free Full Text]
  6. Kjekshus J.K., Maroko P.R., Sobel B.E. Distribution of myocardial injury and its relation to epicardial ST-segment changes after coronary artery occlusion in the dog. Cardiovasc Res (1972) 6:490–499.[Abstract/Free Full Text]
  7. Pelides L.J., Reid D.S., Thomas M., Shillingford J.P. Inhibition by β-blockade of the ST-segment elevation after acute myocardial infarction in man. Cardiovasc Res (1972) 6:295–301.[Abstract/Free Full Text]
  8. Zimmerman A.N.E., Daems W., Hülsmann W.C., et al. Morphological changes of heart muscle caused by successive perfusion with calcium-free and calcium containing solutions (Calcium paradox). Cardiovasc Res (1967) 1:201–209.[Abstract/Free Full Text]
  9. Opthof T. Sense and nonsense of the impact factor. Cardiovasc Res (1997) 33:1–7.[Abstract/Free Full Text]
  10. Cave A.C., Collis C.S., Downey J.M., Hearse D.J. Improved functional recovery by ischaemic preconditioning is not mediated by adenosine in the globally ischaemic isolated rat heart. Cardiovasc Res (1993) 27:663–668.[Abstract/Free Full Text]
  11. Goldbarg A.N., Hellerstein H.K., Bruell J.H., Daroczy A.F. Electrogram of the normal mouse. Mus musculus: general considerations and genetic aspects. Cardiovasc Res (1968) 3:93–99.
  12. Linck B., Boknik P., Eschenhagen T., et al. Messenger RNA expression and immunological quantification of phospholamban and SR-Ca2+-ATPase in failing and nonfailing human hearts. Cardiovasc Res (1996) 31:625–632.[Abstract/Free Full Text]

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