The Globalization of Ethics: Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a major public health burden worldwide, and its prevalence is set to increase owing to widespread population ageing, especially in rapidly developing countries such as Brazil, China, India, and Indonesia. Despite the availability of epidemiological data on the prevalence of AF in North America and Western Europe, corresponding data are limited in Africa, Asia, and South America. Moreover, other observations suggest that the prevalence of AF might be underestimated-not only in low-income and middle-income countries, but also in their high-income counterparts. Future studies are required to provide precise estimations of the global AF burden, identify important risk factors in various regions worldwide, and take into consideration regional and ethnic variations in AF. Furthermore, in response to the increasing prevalence of AF, additional resources will need to be allocated globally for prevention and treatment of AF and its associated complications. In this Review, we discuss the available data on the global prevalence, risk factors, management, financial costs, and clinical burden of AF, and highlight the current worldwide inadequacy of its treatment.

Global epidemiology of atrial fibrillation

There are several criteria for determination of the most appropriate cut-off value in a diagnostic test with continuous results. Mostly based on receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis, there are various methods to determine the test cut-off value. The most common criteria are the point on ROC curve where the sensitivity and specificity of the test are equal; the point on the curve with minimum distance from the left-upper corner of the unit square; and the point where the Youden's index is maximum. There are also methods mainly based on Bayesian decision analysis. Herein, we show that a proposed method that maximizes the weighted number needed to misdiagnose, an index of diagnostic test effectiveness we previously proposed, is the most appropriate technique compared to the aforementioned ones. For determination of the cut-off value, we need to know the pretest probability of the disease of interest as well as the costs incurred by misdiagnosis. This means that even for a certain diagnostic test, the cut-off value is not universal and should be determined for each region and for each disease condition.

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On determining the most appropriate test cut-off value: the case of tests with continuous results

A review of Garfield's journal impact factor and its specific implementation as the Thomson Reuters impact factor reveals several weaknesses in this commonly-used indicator of journal standing Key limitations include the mismatch between citing and cited documents, the deceptive display of three decimals that belies the real precision, and the absence of confidence intervals These are minor issues that are easily amended and should be corrected, but more substantive improvements are needed There are indications that the scientific community seeks and needs better certification of journal procedures to improve the quality of published science Comprehensive certification of editorial and review procedures could help ensure adequate procedures to detect duplicate and fraudulent submissions

Impact factor: outdated artefact or stepping-stone to journal certification?

The State of OA: A large-scale analysis of the prevalence and impact of Open Access articles

Aim
To investigate the correlation between the length of the title of a scientific article and the number of citations it receives, in view of the common editorial call for shorter titles.

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Are shorter article titles more attractive for citations? Cross-sectional study of 22 scientific journals.

Number needed to misdiagnose: a measure of diagnostic test effectiveness.

Scientific journals are important scholarly forums for sharing research findings. Editors have important roles in safeguarding standards of scientific publication and should be familiar with correct presentation of results, among other core competencies. Editors do not have access to the raw data and should thus rely on clues in the submitted manuscripts. To identify probable errors, they should look for inconsistencies in presented results. Common statistical problems that can be picked up by a knowledgeable manuscript editor are discussed in this article. Manuscripts should contain a detailed section on statistical analyses of the data. Numbers should be reported with appropriate precisions. Standard error of the mean (SEM) should not be reported as an index of data dispersion. Mean (standard deviation [SD]) and median (interquartile range [IQR]) should be used for description of normally and non-normally distributed data, respectively. If possible, it is better to report 95% confidence interval (CI) for statistics, at least for main outcome variables. And, P values should be presented, and interpreted with caution, if there is a hypothesis. To advance knowledge and skills of their members, associations of journal editors are better to develop training courses on basic statistics and research methodology for non-experts. This would in turn improve research reporting and safeguard the body of scientific evidence.

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Farrokh Habibzadeh

Papers

On determining the most appropriate test cut-off value: the case of tests with continuous results

Are shorter article titles more attractive for citations? Cross-sectional study of 22 scientific journals.

Number needed to misdiagnose: a measure of diagnostic test effectiveness.

Statistical Data Editing in Scientific Articles

Journal weighted impact factor: A proposal