Citation Analysis of Review Studies on Iranian Retracted Articles in Medical and Health Sciences in Scopus

Abstract

The present study examined review articles in medical sciences and analyzed their citations of retracted Iranian papers. This was a quantitative and applied study using scientometrics and descriptive cross-sectional approaches. Review articles' citation trends of retracted studies were investigated using the quantitative method, and the status of the mentioned citations was determined using the descriptive method. The study population comprised 53 review studies that cited 28 retracted Iranian articles. The current study on review articles citing retracted papers revealed that most citations in 2019 were in the form of systematic reviews and meta-analyses by Iranian authors. These articles were occasionally published in journals with a high credibility and impact factor. Although the most frequent reasons for article retraction in the present study were scientific misconduct, most of the citing review articles did not mention this issue. Further research is required to determine the impact of referencing retracted articles on the results of review articles, especially systematic reviews, meta-analyses, and randomized clinical trials (RCTs), regarding the reasons for retraction.

Keywords

• scientific misconduct
• article retraction
• review articles
• professional misconduct
• plagiarism
• duplicate publications