Survey of the Age Structure of “Age‐Relevant” Articles in Four General Medical Journals
Survey of the Age Structure of “Age‐Relevant” Articles in Four General Medical Journals
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四种综合医学期刊“年龄相关”文章的年龄结构调查
DOI：
10.1111/j.1532-5415.1985.tb04189.x
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发表时间：
1985
影响因子：
6.3
通讯作者：
R. Friedman
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
A. Clarfield;R. Friedman
作者分析了四种普通医学期刊上的临床研究文章（1980年至1982年）：《新英格兰医学杂志》、《内科医学年鉴》、《美国医学会杂志》和《英国医学杂志》。在调查的1943篇文章中，38.2%被认为与老年人临床“相关”。对“相关”文章进行进一步分析，以确定它们是否包含足够的老年受试者，使读者能够对所研究的特定疾病或诊断或治疗方式作出任何推断。“年龄足够”的标准包括：研究组的平均年龄大于或等于60岁；如果小于60岁，则有2例SD或范围至少包括1例70岁患者；研究组中超过或等于20%的人年龄超过60岁。总体而言，略多于50%的临床相关文章中，年龄较大的受试者太少，而作者的年龄标准相当宽松。四种期刊之间没有统计学上的显著差异。在与年龄相关的文章中，25.5%的研究样本平均年龄大于等于60岁，10.9%的研究样本平均年龄大于等于65岁，5.6%的研究样本平均年龄大于等于70岁，2.3%的研究样本平均年龄大于等于75岁。计算老年人中常见的三种情况下所有研究对象的平均年龄：冠状动脉疾病（51.7岁）；高血压（49.8岁）；癌症（52.9岁）。作者得出的结论是，这四家期刊的许多原创文章（1980年至1982年）在他们的研究样本中没有包括足够多的老年受试者，使读者无法对老年人口本身得出任何有效的推断。
The authors analyzed clinical research articles (1980 to 1982) in four general medical journals: New England Journal of Medicine, Annals of Internal Medicine, Journal of the American Medical Association, and British Medical Journal. Of the 1943 articles surveyed, 38.2% were judged to be clinically “relevant” to the elderly. “Relevant” articles were further analyzed to determine whether they contained enough older subjects to enable the reader to draw any inferences about the particular disease or diagnostic or treatment modality studied. Criteria for “age sufficiency” included: mean age of study group () greater than or equal to 60 years; if was less than 60 years, two SD or the range included at least one patient aged 70 years; and greater than or equal to 20% of the study group was older than 60 years. Overall, slightly more than 50% of clinically relevant articles had too few older subjects by the authors' quite liberal age criteria. No statistically significant differences were found among the four journals. Of the age‐relevant articles, 25.5% had a mean age of sample studied of greater than or equal to 60 years, 10.9% of greater than or equal to 65 years, 5.6% of greater than or equal to 70 years, and 2.3% of greater than or equal to 75 years. The average age of all subjects studied for three conditions commonly found among the elderly was calculated: coronary artery disease (51.7 years); hypertension (49.8 years); and cancer (52.9 years). The authors concluded that many of the original articles of these four journals did not include (for 1980 to 1982) enough older subjects in their study samples to enable readers to draw any valid inferences about the older population itself.