Skip to main content

Research involving women and health in the Medline database, 1965–2005: co-term analysis and visualization of main lines of research

Scientometrics volume 88, Article number: 679 (2011) Cite this article

Abstract

This paper shows the main lines of research concerning health and women, as registered in the Medline database, broken down into four 10-year periods: 1965–1974, 1975–1984, 1985–1994, and 1995–2005. The units of analysis used were the Medline “MeSH” major terms, processed by means of co-term analysis. For graphic representation, the social network approach was used, with pruning performed by Pathfinder Networks (PFNET), so as to concentrate the displays. Factor analysis was used to group the descriptors and identify the main lines of research involving health and women. The results show that research on Health and Women has increased and undergone significant changes over the past 40 years, yet such studies are not given due importance.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution.

Access options

Buy single article

Instant access to the full article PDF.

USD 39.95

Price includes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4

References

  • Batagelj, V., & Mrvar, A. (2010). Pajek 1.28: Package for large network analysis. Cambridge, NY: CUP.

    Google Scholar 

  • Benzecri, J. P. (1976). L’Analyse des Données, Tome II: L’ Analyse des Correspondances. París: Dunod.

    Google Scholar 

  • Benzecri, J. P., et al. (1981). Pratique de l’analyse des données, Linguistique et lexicologie. Paris: Dunod.

    Google Scholar 

  • Berlin, A. J., & Ellenberg, S. S. (2009). Inclusion of women in clinical trials. BMC Medicine, 7(56). http://www.biomedcentral.com/1741-7015/7/56.

  • Blake, M. B., Ince, M., & Dean, C. J. (2005). Inclusion of women in cardiac research: Current trends and need for reassessment. Gender Medicine, 2(2), 71–75.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Borrell, C., & Artazcoz, L. (2008). The inequalities of gender in health: Challenges for the future. Revista Española de Salud Pública, 82(3), 245–249.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Braam, R. R., Moed, H. F., & Van Raan, A. F. J. (1991a). Mapping of science by combined co-citation and word analysis. I. Structural aspects. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 42(4), 233–251.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Braam, R. R., Moed, H. F., & Van Raan, A. F. J. (1991b). Mapping of science by combined co-citation and word analysis. II. Dynamical aspects. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 42(4), 252–266.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Callon, M., Courtial, J. P., Turner, W. A., & Bauin, S. (1983). From translations to problematic networks: An introduction to co-word analysis. Social Science Information (Sur Les Sciences Sociales), 22, 191–235.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cambrosio, A., Limoges, C., Courtial, J. P., & Laville, F. (1993). Historial scientometrics? Mapping over 70 years of biological safety research with co-word analysis. Scientometrics, 27(2), 119–243.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chen, C. H. (2002). Mapping scientific frontiers. London: Springer.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chen, C., Paul, R. J., & O’Keefe, B. (2001). Fitting the jigsaw of citation: Information visualization in domain analysis. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology (JASIST), 52(4), 315–330.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Clarke, J. N. (1983). Sexism, feminism and medicalism: A decade of literature on gender and illness. Sociology of Health & Illness, 5(1), 62–82.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Courtial, P., Cahlik, T., & Callon, M. (1994). A model for social interaction between cognition and action through a key-word simulation of knowledge growth. Scientometrics, 31(2), 173–192.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Daly, C., Clemens, F., Lopes Sendon, J. L., Tavazzi, L., Boersma, E., Danchin, N., et al. (2006). Gender differences in the management and clinical outcome of stable angina. Circulation, 113(4), 490–498.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Biblioteca Regional de Medicina (BIREME). (1967). Descriptores en ciencias de la salud, DeCS, Brasil. Accessed February 20, 2009, from http://decs.bvs.br/E/decswebe.htm.

  • Devesa, S. S., Bray, F., Vizcaino, A. P., & Parkin, D. M. (2005). International lung cancer trends by histologic type: Male:female differences diminishing and adenocarcinoma rates rising. International Journal of Cancer, 117(2), 294–299.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ding, Y., Chowdhurry, G., & Foot, S. (2001). Bibliometric cartography of information retrieval research by using co-word analysis. Information Processing Management, 37(6), 67–78.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fuster, V. (2010). No se ha dado a la mujer la importancia que se debería en temas de salud cardiovascular, Entrevista en el “El País Digital”. Accessed July 21, 2010, from http://www.elpais.com/articulo/sociedad/ha/dado/mujer/importancia/deberia/temas/salud/cardiovascular/elpepusoc/20100721elpepusoc_7/Tes.

  • Gender and Health Group. (2000). Guidelines for the analysis of Gender and Health Group. Accessed March 8, 2010, from http://www.lstmliverpool.ac.uk/research/academic-groups/international-health/gender-and-health-group/guidelines.

  • Gowen, A. (2009). Pregnant women in D.C. Area cautious about Flu Shot. Washington Post.

  • Hamberg, K., Risberg, G., & Johansson, E. E. (2004). Male and female physicians show different patterns of gender bias. A paper-case study of management of irritable bowel syndrome. Scandinavian Journal of Public Health, 32(2), 144–152.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Inclusion of Women and Minorities in Clinical-Trials and the NIH-Revitalization-Act of 1993. (1995). The perspective of NIH Clinical Trialists. Controlled Clinical Trials, 16(5), 277–312.

    Google Scholar 

  • Institute of Medicine. (2001). Committee on understanding the biology of sex and gender differences. In T. M. Wizemann & M.-L. Pardu (Eds.), Exploring the biological contributions to human health: Does sex matter?. Washington: National Academy Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kamada, T., & Kawai, S. (1989). An algorithm for drawing general undirected graphs. Information Processing Letters, 31, 7–15.

    MathSciNet  MATH  Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kerrigan, D., Andrinopoulos, K., Chung, S., Glass, B., & Ellen, J. (2008). Gender ideologies, socioeconomic opportunities, and HIV/STI-related vulnerability among female, African-American adolescents. Journal of Urban Health, 85(5), 717–726.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Krempel, L. (1999). Visualizing networks with spring embedders: Two-mode and valued graphs. In International sunbelt social network conference, Charleston, SC.

  • Lalonde, M. (1974). Social values and public hygiene. Canadian Journal of Public Health (Revue Canadienne de Sante Publique), 65(4), 260–268.

    Google Scholar 

  • Leviatan, U., & Cohen, J. (1985). Gender differences in life expectancy among kibbutz members. Social Science Medicine, 21(5), 545–551.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Leydesdorff, L. (1997). Why words and co-words cannot map the development of the sciences. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 48(5), 418–427.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Leydesdorff, L., & Rafols, I. (2009). A global map of science based on the ISI subject categories. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 60(2), 348–462.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Merkatz, R. B., & Junod, S. W. (1994). Historical background of changes in FDA policy on the study an evaluation of drugs in women. Academic Medicine, 69(9), 703–707.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Morris, S. A., Yen, G., Wu, Z., & Asnake, B. (2003). Timeline visualization of research fronts. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 54(5), 413–422.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Moya-Anegón, F., Vargas-Quesada, B., Chinchilla-Rodríguez, Z., Corera-Álvarez, E., González-Molina, A., Munoz-Fernández, F. J., et al. (2007). Visualizing the Marrow of Science. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology (JASIST), 58(14), 2167–2179.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nathanson, C. A. (1975). Illness and the feminine role: A theoretical review. Social Science and Medicine, 9, 57–62.

    MathSciNet  Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nathanson, C. A. (1977). Sex, illness and medical care: A review of data, theory and method. Social Science and Medicine, 11, 13–25.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nobelius, A. M., & Wainer, J. (2004). Gender and medicine: A conceptual guide for medical educators. Victoria: Monash University School of Rural Health. http://www.med.monash.edu.au/gendermed/docs/A4TutorManual120504screen.pdf.

  • Noyons, E. C. M., & Calero-Medina, C. (2008). Applying bibliometric mapping in a high level science policy context. Scientometrics, 79(2), 261–275.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Onyancha, O. B., & Ocholla, D. N. (2005). Informetric investigation of the relatedness of opportunistic infections to HIV/AIDS. Information Processing and Management, 41(6), 1573–1588.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ovid Technologies. (2005). http://www.ovid.com.

  • Schvaneveldt, R. W. (Ed.). (1990). Pathfinder associative networks: Studies in knowledge organization. Norwood: ABLEX.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sen, G., George, A., & Östlin, P. (2005a). Incorporación de la perspectiva de género en la investigación y en las políticas en salud: una perspectiva de género. Harvard: Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sen, G., George, A., & Östlin, P. (2005b). Incorporar la perspectiva de género en la equidad en salud: un análisis de la investigación y las políticas. Washington: Organización Panamericana de la Salud.

  • Singh-Manoux, A., Gueguen, A., Ferrie, J., Shipley, M., Martikainen, P., Bonenfant, S., et al. (2008). Gender differences in the association between morbidity and mortality among middle-aged men and women. American Journal of Public Health, 98(12), 2251–2257.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Van Raan, A. F. J., & Tijssen, R. J. W. (1993). The neuronal net of neuronal network research. An exercise in bibliometric mapping. Scientometrics, 26(1), 169–192.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Vargas-Quesada, B., Chinchilla-Rodríguez, Z., González-Molina, A., & Moya-Anegón, F. (2010). Showing the essential science structure of a scientific domain and its evolution. Information Visualization, 9, 288–300.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Verbrugge, L. M. (1978). Females and illness: Recent trends in sex differences in the United States. Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 17(4), 387–403.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Verbrugge, L. M. (1985). Gender and health: An update of hypotheses. Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 26(3), 156–182.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Verbrugge, L. M. (1989). The Twain meet: Empirical explanations of sex differences in health and mortality. Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 30(3), 282–304.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Vivian, W., & Pinn, M. D. (2003). Sex and gender factors in medical studies. Implications for health and clinical practice. Journal of the American Medical Association, 289(4), 397–400.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Vivian, W., & Pinn, M. D. (2005). Research on women’s health. Progress and opportunities. Journal of the American Medical Association, 294(11), 1407–1410.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Vivian, W., & Pinn, M. D. (2006). Women’s health research and health leadership: Benchmarks of the continuum. Journal of Dental Education, 70(11 Supplement), 27–34.

    Google Scholar 

  • Waldron, I. (1978). Why do women live longer than men? Social Science and Medicine, 10(7–8), 349–362.

    Google Scholar 

  • White, H. D. (2003). Pathfinder networks and author co-citation analysis: A remapping of paradigmatic information scientist. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology (JASIST), 54(5), 423–434.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • White, H. D., & Mccain, K. W. (1998). Visualizing a discipline: An author co-citation analysis of information science, 1972–1995. Journal of the American Society for Information Science (JASIS), 49(4), 327–355.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wingard, D. (1984). The sex differential in morbility in morbidity, mortality and lifestyle. Annual Review of Public Health, 5, 433–458.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Women’s Health Bureau. (2002). Exploring concepts of gender and health. Ottawa: Health Canada.

    Google Scholar 

  • World Health Organization (WHO). (1998). Gender and health: A technical paper. Geneva.

  • World Health Organization (WHO). (2002). Integrating gender perspectives in the work of WHO: WHO Gender Policy. http://www.who.int/gender/documents/engpolicy.pdf.

  • World Health Organization (WHO). (2006). Constitution of the World Health Organization, Basic documents, Forty-fifth edition, Supplement, October 2006. http://www.who.int/governance/eb/who_constitution_en.pdf.

Download references

Acknowledgments

This study was made possible through an agreement with the Observatorio de Salud de la Mujer, under Spain’s Ministerio de Sanidad y Consumo. The authors wish to express their gratitude to the anonymous reviewers for their many useful comments, suggestions and help.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Information Science Faculty, University of Alcalá, C/ San Cirilo s/n, 28804, Alcalá de Henares, Madrid, Spain

    M. Angeles Zulueta, Gisela Cantos-Mateos & Carmen Sánchez

  2. Communication and Information Science Faculty, University of Granada, Colegio Máximo de Cartuja s/n, 18071, Granada, Spain

    Benjamín Vargas-Quesada

  3. CSIC, Unidad Asociada Grupo SCImago, Madrid, Spain

    M. Angeles Zulueta & Benjamín Vargas-Quesada

Authors
  1. M. Angeles Zulueta
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Gisela Cantos-Mateos
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Benjamín Vargas-Quesada
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Carmen Sánchez
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Benjamín Vargas-Quesada.

Appendices

Annex I

See Tables 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10.

Table 6 Factor membership
Full size table
Table 7 Factor membership
Full size table
Table 8 Factor membership
Full size table
Table 9 Factor membership
Full size table
Table 10 Factor membership
Full size table

Annex II

Descriptors (Ranked by number of axis and factor loadings) Frequency
Full period
1965–2005 		Frequency
1st period
1965–1974 		Frequency
2nd period
1975–1984 		Frequency
3rd period
1985–1994 		Frequency
4th period
1995–2005
Mammography 5,842 256 577 1,630 3,379
Antineoplastic Combined Chemotherapy Protocols 4,405    1,404 3,001
Antineoplastic Agents 2,532   591   1,941
Tamoxifen 2,976   299 918 1,759
Receptors, Estrogen 2,044   822 1,222  
Carcinoma 2,261 455 590 1,216  
Breast 3,598   543 1,227 1,828
Carcinoma, Intraductal, Noninfiltrating 1,744 229 432 1,083  
Carcinoma, Ductal, Breast 3,108     3,108
Mass Screening 15,023 712 1,183 3,998 9,130
Estrogens 1,081 443 638   
Breast Neoplasms 90,676 5,540 13,049 23,188 48,899
Estrogen Replacement Therapy 6,733    1,251 5,482
Uterine Cervical Neoplasms 3,528 383 414 819 1,912
Patient Acceptance of Health Care 3,611    919 2,692
Menopause 7,460 834 1,472 2,422 2,732
Gender Identity 4,377   732 1,862 1,783
Violence 4,028   355 1,096 2,577
Adolescent Behavior 2,008     2,008
Social Support 2,658    815 1,843
Adaptation, Psychological 11,305 455 950 3,529 6,371
Stress, Psychological 12,245 630 1,740 3,187 6,688
Family 9,529 724 1,594 3,322 3,889
Aged 6,809 653 1,765 1,979 2,412
Neoplasms 3,229   354 856 2,019
Employment 3,101   486 798 1,817
Quality of Life 2,986     2,986
Health Status 8,120   388 1,677 6,055
Mothers 7,030   651 1,949 4,430
Attitude to Health 13,507 492 1,143 2,755 9,117
Women 5,860 372 1,316 2,004 2,168
Gender Identity 4,377   732 1,862 1,783
Nurses 1,774   560 1,214  
Mental Disorders 4,609 447 555 1,146 2,461
Health Promotion 5,045    1,256 3,789
Health Education 7,012 387 1,084 2,125 3,416
Health Behavior 4,508    931 3,577
Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice 8,906    1,580 7,326
African Americans 2,953    691 2,262
Women’s Health 6,230    934 5,296
Family Planning Services 3,300 1,108 1,189 1,003  
Health Services Accessibility 2,842     2,842
Attitude of Health Personnel 8,681 253 667 1,868 5,893
Poverty 1,906     1,906
Smoking 3,571   417 955 2,199
Patient Acceptance of Health Care 3,611    919 2,692
Women 5,860 372 1,316 2,004 2,168
Attitude to Health 13,507 492 1,143 2,755 9,117
Adolescent Behavior 2,008     2,008
Sexual Behavior 8,418 570 1,242 2,490 4,116
Abortion, Induced 7,064 958 2,010 1,796 2,300
Abortion, Legal 2,708 922 878 908  
Ethics, Medical 4,019 239 584 1,414 1,782
Decision Making 2,340     2,340
Pregnancy Complications 31,321 6,177 6,570 8,017 10,557
Alcoholism 1,703   541 1,162  
Substance Related Disorders 16,657 1,656 2,444 5,053 7,504
Fetus 10,884 2,227 3,138 2,492 3,027
Mental Disorders 4,609 447 555 1,146 2,461
Smoking 3,571   417 955 2,199
Anti HIV Agents 3,019     3,019
HIV 1 6,345    1,523 4,822
Pregnancy Complications, Infectious 3,097    891 2,206
HIV Infections 25,671    4,771 20,900
Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome 14,441   417 8,771 5,253
Sexual Behavior 8,418 570 1,242 2,490 4,116

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Zulueta, M.A., Cantos-Mateos, G., Vargas-Quesada, B. et al. Research involving women and health in the Medline database, 1965–2005: co-term analysis and visualization of main lines of research. Scientometrics 88, 679 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-011-0455-1

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Published:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-011-0455-1

Keywords

  • Medline
  • Co-term
  • Health
  • Women
  • Research
  • Social networks
  • PFNET
  • Maps