The Pipeline From Abstract Presentation to Publication in Pediatric Hospital Medicine
BACKGROUND: The annual Pediatric Hospital Medicine (PHM) conference serves as a venue for the dissemination of research in this rapidly growing discipline. A measure of research validity is subsequent publication in peer-reviewed journals.
OBJECTIVE: To identify the publication rate of abstracts submitted to the 2014 PHM conference and determine whether presentation format was associated with subsequent journal publication or time to publication.
METHODS: We identified abstracts submitted to the 2014 PHM conference. Presentation formats included rejected abstracts and poster and oral presentations. Abstracts subsequently published in journals were identified by searching the author and abstract title in PubMed, MedEdPORTAL, and Google Scholar. We used logistic regression and Cox proportional hazards models to determine if presentation format was associated with publication, time to publication, and publishing journal impact factor.
RESULTS: Of 226 submitted abstracts, 19.0% were rejected, 68.0% were selected for posters, and 12.8% were selected for oral presentations; 36.3% were subsequently published within 30 months after the conference. Abstracts accepted for oral presentation had more than 7-fold greater odds of publication (adjusted odds ratio 7.8; 95% confidence interval [CI], 2.6-23.5) and a 4-fold greater likelihood of publication at each month (adjusted hazard ratio 4.5; 95% CI, 2.1-9.7) compared with rejected abstracts. Median journal impact factor was significantly higher for oral presentations than other presentation formats (P < 0.01).
CONCLUSIONS: Abstract reviewers may be able to identify methodologically sound studies for presentation; however, the low overall publication rate may indicate that presented results are preliminary or signify a need for increased mentorship and resources for research development in PHM.
© 2018 Society of Hospital Medicine
Pediatric hospital medicine (PHM) is one of the most rapidly growing disciplines in pediatrics,1 with 8% of pediatric residency graduates each year entering the field.2 Research plays an important role in advancing care in the field and is a critical component for board certification and fellowship accreditation.3-6 The annual PHM conference, which has been jointly sponsored by the Academic Pediatric Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the Society of Hospital Medicine, is an important venue for the dissemination of research findings. Abstract selection is determined by peer review; however, reviewers are provided with only a brief snapshot of the research, which may not contain sufficient information to fully evaluate the methodological quality of the work.7-10 Additionally, while instructions are provided, reviewers often lack formal training in abstract review. Consequently, scores may vary.9
Publication in a peer-reviewed journal is considered a measure of research success because it requires more rigorous peer review than the abstract selection process at scientific meetings.11-16 Rates of subsequent journal publication differ based on specialty and meeting, and they have been reported at 23% to 78%.10,12,14-18 In pediatrics, publication rates after presentation at scientific meetings range from 36% to 63%, with mean time to publication ranging from 20 to 26 months following the meeting.11,19,20 No studies have reviewed abstract submissions to the annual PHM meeting to determine if selection or presentation format is associated with subsequent publication in a peer-reviewed journal.
We sought to identify the publication rate of abstracts submitted to the 2014 PHM conference and determine whether presentation format was associated with the likelihood of subsequent journal publication or time to publication.
METHODS
Study Design
Data for this retrospective cohort study were obtained from a database of all abstracts submitted for presentation at the 2014 PHM conference in Lake Buena Vista, Florida.
Main Exposures
The main exposure was presentation format, which was categorized as not presented (ie, rejected), poster presentation, or oral presentation. PHM has a blinded abstract peer-review process; in 2014, an average of 10 reviewers scored each abstract. Reviewers graded abstracts on a scale of 1 (best in category) to 7 (unacceptable for presentation) according to the following criteria: originality, scientific importance, methodological rigor, and quality of presentation. Abstracts with the lowest average scores in each content area, usually less than or equal to 3, were accepted as oral presentations while most abstracts with scores greater than 5 were rejected. For this study, information collected from each abstract included authors, if the primary author was a trainee, title, content area, and presentation format. Content areas included clinical research, educational research, health services research (HSR) and/or epidemiology, practice management research, and quality improvement. Abstracts were then grouped by presentation format and content area for analysis. The Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting, another common venue for the presentation of pediatric research, precedes the PHM conference. Because acceptance for PAS presentation may represent more strongly developed abstract submissions for PHM, we identified which abstracts had also been presented at the PAS conference that same year by cross-referencing authors and abstract titles with the PAS 2014 program.
