Why the study?
Little is known about the state of Anesthesia and Critical Care Medicine (ACCM) research in Africa.
This bibliometric analysis highlights that African ACCM research is predominantly observational and driven by a few key countries like Nigeria and South Africa, indicating a need for capacity building and higher-level evidence generation.
Evidence base for African ACCM is predominantly observational from limited countries; extends calls for capacity building and higher-level trials.
Background Research is an essential component of Anesthesia, and the contributions of researchers and institutions can be appreciated from the analysis of scholarly outputs. Such analyses help identify major contributors and trends in publication. Little is known about the state of Anesthesia and Critical Care Medicine (ACCM) research in Africa. In this study, the authors analyzed the study designs and contributions to ACCM research in Africa. Methods The authors searched PubMed, Embase, Web of Science, and CINAHL from inception to May 4, 2020, for articles on or about ACCM in Africa. The titles and abstracts of the articles were screened first on Rayyan. Then, the full-text of eligible articles were screened. Data were extracted, and the number of articles per physician anesthesia providers and provider density were calculated. Kruskal Wallis test and Spearman's correlation were used, and a P -value <0.05 was considered to be statistically significant. Results Of the 4690 articles, only 886 (18.9%) were included in the analysis. The articles were published between 1946 and 2020 in 278 target journals. 55 (6.2%) articles were published in the South African Journal of Surgery, 51 (5.8%) in Anesthesia and Analgesia, and 46 (5.2%) in Anaesthesia. 291 (32.8%) studies were cross-sectional. 195 (22.0%) first authors were from Nigeria, 118 (13.3%) from South Africa, and 88 (9.9%) from the USA. Malawi (1.67), Togo (1.06), and Sierra Leone (1.00) had the highest number of articles per provider. Whereas Ethiopia (580.00), Nigeria (336.21), and Malawi (333.33) had the highest number of articles per provider density. Conclusion The results reported in this study highlight contributions of Africans and the hierarchy of evidence in African anesthesiology research and critical care medicine. These results may aid in setting the research agenda.
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Kanmounye et al. (2020) studied this question.
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