Research on health inequalities: A bibliometric analysis (1966-2014)

Louise Bouchard; Marcelo Albertini; Ricardo Batista; Joanne de Montigny

doi:10.1016/j.socscimed.2015.07.022

Research on health inequalities: A bibliometric analysis (1966-2014)

Soc Sci Med. 2015 Sep:141:100-8. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2015.07.022. Epub 2015 Jul 26.

Authors

Louise Bouchard¹, Marcelo Albertini², Ricardo Batista³, Joanne de Montigny⁴

Affiliations

¹ Institute of Population Health, University of Ottawa, 1 Stewart St. Room 225, Ottawa, Ontario, K1N 6N5, Canada. Electronic address: Louise.Bouchard@uottawa.ca.
² Faculty of Computer Science, Federal University of Uberlandia, Av. Joao Naves de Avila, 2.121, Sala 1B150, Uberlandia, Minas Gerais, CEP 38400-902, Brazil. Electronic address: albertini@ufu.br.
³ Institute of Population Health, University of Ottawa, 1 Stewart St. Room 225, Ottawa, Ontario, K1N 6N5, Canada. Electronic address: Rbati057@uottawa.ca.
⁴ Institute of Population Health, University of Ottawa, 1 Stewart St. Room 225, Ottawa, Ontario, K1N 6N5, Canada. Electronic address: joanne.de.montigny@sympatico.ca.

PMID: 26259012
DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2015.07.022

Abstract

The objective of this study is to report on research production and publications on health inequalities through a bibliometric analysis covering publications from 1966 to 2014 and a content analysis of the 25 most-cited papers. A database of 49,294 references was compiled from the search engine Web of Science. The first article appears in 1966 and deals with equality and civil rights in the United States and the elimination of racial discrimination in access to medical care. By 2003, the term disparity has gained in prominence relative to the term inequality which was initially elected by the researchers. Marmot's 1991 article is one of the five papers with the largest number of citations and contributes to the central perspective of social determinants of health and the British influence on the international status of research on social inequalities of health.

Keywords: Bibliometric; Disparities; Health equity; Inequalities.

MeSH terms

Bibliometrics*
Health Services Research*
Healthcare Disparities*
Humans