Examining the Correlation Between Altmetric Score and Citations in the General Surgery Literature

With the emergence of social media platforms, new bibliometric profiles measuring impact and exposure of scientific research online have been introduced as an alternative to traditional bibliometric outcomes. The objective of this article is to evaluate relationships between Altmetric scores, journal impact factor, and citation counts among the surgical literature. We analyzed the top 10 highest cited articles for the 10 general surgery journals with the highest impact factors for 2013 and 2016 by noting citation counts and Altmetric scores for each article. We also identified the journal impact factor and age of journal associated Twitter accounts. Variables were assessed for correlation using Pearson’s correlation testing via Microsoft Excel. A total of 240 articles were analyzed. For 2013, Altmetrics score analysis demonstrated a significant, positive correlation with citation number (r = 0.462, P