Publication Rate of Abstracts Presented at the North American Neuro-Ophthalmology Society Annual Meeting From 2008 to 2017

Conference abstracts serve an important role in the timely dissemination of scientific and clinical advancements, but most fail to be published. The goal of this study was to investigate the publication rate and factors associated with publication of abstracts presented at the North American Neuro-Ophthalmology Society (NANOS) Annual Meeting over a 10-year perio

Original Contribution Section Editors: Clare Fraser, MD Susan Mollan, MD Publication Rate of Abstracts Presented at the North American Neuro-Ophthalmology Society Annual Meeting From 2008 to 2017 Po Hsiang (Shawn) Yuan, BSc, Luke J. MacLean, MASc, Erica A. Li, MMASc, Shelly Yin, MD, CM, Jonathan A. Micieli, BSc Background: Conference abstracts serve an important role in the timely dissemination of scientific and clinical advancements, but most fail to be published. The goal of this study was to investigate the publication rate and factors associated with publication of abstracts presented at the North American Neuro-Ophthalmology Society (NANOS) Annual Meeting over a 10-year period. Methods: NANOS Annual Meeting abstracts from 2008 to 2017 were extracted and categorized into Walsh presentations, scientific platforms, or poster presentations. An original automated web scraping program was validated to search PubMed, Embase, Medline, and Google Scholar for publications. Publication date, journal, authors, study type, multicenter involvement, and financial disclosures were retrieved. Results: A total of 195 Walsh presentations, 231 scientific platform presentations, and 1735 scientific posters were included in the study with an overall publication rate of 31.5% (681/2,161). This was stable over the study period. Publication was the highest for scientific platforms (67.1%), followed by Walsh abstracts (36.4%) and poster presentations (27.2%). Multivariable analysis identified 3–4 authors, 5 or more authors, basic science, and sample size of 100 or more significantly correlated with subsequent publication. The top 3 countries for NANOS submissions were the United States, Canada, and South Korea, and the most frequent journal of publication was the Journal of Neuro-Ophthalmology. Faculty of Medicine (PH(S)Y, LJM), University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada; Department of Engineering (LJM), University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada; Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry (EAL), Western University, London, Canada; Department of Ophthalmology and Vision Sciences (JAM), Department of Medicine, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada; Division of Neurology (JAM), Department of Medicine, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada; and Kensington Vision and Research Centre (JAM), Toronto, Canada. The authors report no conflicts of interest. S. Yin contributed as an unaffiliated author. Address correspondence to Jonathan A. Micieli, Kensington Vision and Research Centre, 340 College Street, Suite 501, Toronto, ON, Canada M5T 3A9; E-mail: [e-mail] e692 Conclusions: Publication rate of NANOS abstracts is comparable to other conferences in ophthalmology and the neurological sciences. Conference attendees should be aware that more than two-thirds of abstracts fail to be published and publication rates vary widely by type of submission. Journal of Neuro-Ophthalmology 2021;41:e692–e698 doi: 10.1097/WNO.0000000000001158 © 2020 by North American Neuro-Ophthalmology Society S cientific publication in peer-reviewed journals is an important way of disseminating scientific information and formalizing credit for research work. Many medical research projects are presented at annual local, national, and international meetings hosted by specific societies before they are formalized into publication. These meetings play an important role in the translation of knowledge that can include the generation of new ideas, novel clinical applications, and improvements to patient care and outcomes. A major benefit of such meetings is the timely dissemination of new and relevant knowledge to experts in a field without the delay of a lengthy publication process. These meetings also encourage interaction among colleagues, allowing for research projects to be refined and improved. However, more than half of all abstracts and one-third of randomized clinical trials initially presented at scientific conferences across all disciplines fail to be published in scientific journals (1,2). Failure to include these nonpublished data may lead to bias in systematic reviews, especially because most conference abstracts are not indexed in commonly used bibliographic databases and imposed word limits preclude authors from stating their methodology and results in full (3). Inconsistencies between conference abstracts and their corresponding journal articles and overstating conclusions in conference abstracts have also been reported (4–7). Moreover, conference abstracts lack the same rigorous review process Yuan et al: J Neuro-Ophthalmol 2021; 41: e692-e698 Copyright © North American Neuro-Ophthalmology Society. Unauthorized reproduction of this article is prohibited. Original Contribution found in peer-reviewed journals, and limited information is available to selection committees of these conferences. Many conferences will accept all abstracts to the meeting with higher quality projects being selected for oral presentation. Clinicians may use knowledge obtained at annual meetings to alter their patient care. Therefore, it is important to assess the quality of information presented at academic clinical conferences as a surrogate metric for its scientific validity. The publication rates of several eye and vision conferences were the subject of a systematic review, which found that the weighted percentage of abstracts published from 11 unique conferences was 38.0% and this ranged from 11.0 to 65.6% (3). Several articles have looked at the publication rate of the neuro-ophthalmology subsections of ophthalmology conferences, including the Canadian Ophthalmological Society (COS) and the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) meetings (8–11). These articles found a publication rate of less than 5% in the 2010 COS meeting (10) but a 35.0% rate in the 2010–2015 COS meetings (8). The AAO meetings were found to have a publication rate of 45.5% from the 2008 conference (11) and 34.8% from the 2012–2013 (9) meeting for the neuroophthalmology subsection. No previous study has looked at the fate of abstracts from the North American NeuroOphthalmology Society (NANOS) annual meeting, and it was therefore our goal to assess the publication rate and factors influencing publication from the 2008–2017 annual meetings. METHODS The detailed programs for the 2008–2017 NANOS Annual Meetings were obtained directly from the NANOS meetings or NANOS members and used to compile a data set on all posters and presentations. The inclusion criteria for a previous Cochrane review was follow-up of at least 24 months to assess full publication and 2017 was therefore chosen as the most recent year for a 10-year review of the most recent NANOS Annual Meeting submissions (2). The search was performed in April 2020. Presentations were subdivided into 3 categories (1) Walsh meeting oral presentations, (2) oral scientific platform presentations, and (3) poster presentations. Starting in 2016, poster presentations were split into scientific posters and case-based posters (as Poster Presentations I: Clinical Highlights in NeuroOphthalmology). A separate analysis was performed for 2016–2017 to compare the fate of scientific vs case-based posters. Original software was then designed between Python, MATLAB, and VBA to automate the collection of the following information for each abstract (12). Collected data included abstract title, number of abstract authors, year of presentation, relevant diagnosis, keywords, first and last author’s academic institution, first author’s country of origin, total number of institutions, and the presentation category. Yuan et al: J Neuro-Ophthalmol 2021; 41: e692-e698 A reviewer (P.H(S).Y.) performed manual searches for a subset of 531 NANOS abstracts using PubMed, Embase, Medline, and Google Scholar databases to find matching published journal articles. The following search strategy was used across all databases: 1. [Author: First author last name] AND [Author: Last author last name] AND [key words separated by commas] AND [Date: year of Annual Meeting to 2020 inclusive]. If a search yielded no matching publication, repeated searches were performed with a combination of: 2. Differing keywords; 3. Removal of first author last name and/or removal of last author last name. 4. If no publication was found by the fifth search, it was deemed that the abstract did not have a corresponding published article. 5. If a publication was found, it was reviewed to ensure the details of the published article matched the details found in the NANOS abstract. A custom web scraping software was then designed to replicate this search strategy. The algorithm suggested the most likely publication(s) (up to 5) for each abstract. Two authors (L.J.M. and P.H(S).Y.) then reviewed the outputs and selected the matching publication based on identifying details found in the abstract and the published article. This semiautomated search strategy (n = 2,171) was validated against the manually searched abstracts (n = 531), which yielded a 96.6% accuracy. This algorithm facilitated the automatic collection of the following information for each identified publication into the data set: publication title, (number of) authors, year of publication, journal, and most recent impact factor. These data were then summarized with descriptive statistics. Characteristics of each study were used to determine factors that influence publication, and these included basic science (animal or cell-culture study) or clinical study, prospective study or retrospective study for noncase report studies, sample size of 100 or more total included in the study, and multicenter or single-center study. These study characteristics were manually extracted by 2 independent authors (E.A.L. and S.Y.). The affiliations listed on the abstract were used to determine whether one or multiple institutions were involved. Multiple affiliations for one author were excluded from the institution count. A multicentered study was defined as a study that involved more than 1 author and affiliations of more than 1 institution. When determining the country of origin, the first author location was used for analysis. Impact factors for published journals were obtained from the Thomson Reuters Journal Citation Reports (13). Statistical Analysis The changes in number of abstracts accepted at the NANOS Annual Meetings and changes in publication rates were calculated over a 10-year period. To investigate correlations between presentation types, author numbers, countries, time e693 Copyright © North American Neuro-Ophthalmology Society. Unauthorized reproduction of this article is prohibited. Original Contribution taken from abstract to publication, and publication rates, Fisher exact tests and analyses of varience were conducted as appropriate. A minimum cut-off of 20 accepted abstracts (a mean of 2 abstracts/year) for each country was implemented to exclude nonmeaningful data. A logistic regression multivariable analysis of published presentations was used to determine publication trends and predictors of publication, taking into consideration factors, such as basic science or clinical study, retrospective or prospective study design, presence of a financial disclosure, sample size greater than 100 total participants, and multicentered or single-centered study. These variables were chosen based on previous studies and factors that the authors hypothesized may contribute to the publication rate. The Hosmer–Lemeshow test was used to determine the goodness of fit for variables included, and the odds ratios (ORs) with the corresponding 95% confidence intervals and P values were reported. SPSS (www.ibm.com) software was used to perform this analysis. RESULTS A total of 195 Walsh presentations, 231 scientific platform presentations, and 1735 poster presentations were included in the study from the 2008 to 2017 NANOS meetings. There were 258 case-based posters from 2016 to 2017. The number of Walsh presentations and scientific platform presentations was generally constant over each year. However, there was a general increase in the number of poster presentations (Fig. 1). Most abstracts were clinical studies (2062/2,161; 95.4%), sample size was greater than 100 in 236 of the 2,161 (10.9%), and 994 of 2,161 (46.0%) were multicenter studies. Most NANOS abstracts had 3–4 authors (846/2,161; 39.1%), whereas 501 of the 2,161 (23.2%) had 1–2 authors and 814 of the 2,161 (37.7%) had 5 or more authors. The mean (±SD) number of authors was 4.2 ± 1.8 for Walsh presentations, 5.8 ± 3.2 for scientific platform presentations, and 4.1 ± 2.3 for poster presentations. Based on our subset analysis for poster presentations, in 2016–2017, the number of authors was 3.5 ± 1.9 for case-based posters and 5.8 ± 3.2 for scientific posters. The 2016–2017 subset of case-based posters had statistically significant fewer authors than any other group, but there were no statistically significant differences between any groups of presentations when poster presentations were pooled (Fig. 2). The publication rates (mean ± SD) for poster presentations in 2016–2017 were 15.6 ± 2.4% for case-based posters and 43.7 ± 1.2% for scientific posters (Fig. 3). As of April 1, 2020, of the 2,161 total NANOS abstracts, 681 were published, resulting in an overall publication rate of 31.5%. The overall publication rate for Walsh presentations was 36.4% (71/195), scientific platforms was 67.1% (155/ 231), and poster presentations was 27.2% (472/1735). Compared with poster presentations, the other 2 abstract categories were significantly more likely to have been published with an OR (95% confidence interval [CI]) for Walsh abstracts of 1.5 (95% CI 1.1–2.1) and scientific platforms of e694 FIG. 1. Number of NANOS abstracts by category and year. Platform and Walsh refer to scientific platform presentations and Walsh abstracts, respectively. Poster refers to poster presentations, which starting in 2016 were separated into distinct case-based posters and scientific posters (not shown). 5.5 (4.1–7.3). The overall publication rate remained relatively constant across the study period as shown in Figure 3. Similarly, the publication rate for the scientific platform was also consistent, and this category maintained the highest publication rate of any presentation type. A multivariable logistic regression analysis adjusting for publication year and abstract category revealed that 3–4 authors, 5 or more authors, basic science, and sample size of 100 or more significantly correlated with subsequent publication (Table 1). The top 3 countries for NANOS submissions overall were the United States (1,482/2,161; 68.6%), Canada (151/2,161; FIG. 2. Box plot demonstrating the number of authors per abstract in each category. The box shows the interquartile range, the line shows the median of the data and the notch displays the 95% confidence interval around the median. Poster, poster presentations; Walsh, Walsh abstracts; platform, scientific platform presentations. Yuan et al: J Neuro-Ophthalmol 2021; 41: e692-e698 Copyright © North American Neuro-Ophthalmology Society. Unauthorized reproduction of this article is prohibited. Original Contribution FIG. 3. Publication rate by abstract category and year. Overall, overall pooled data; Walsh; Walsh abstracts; platform, scientific platform presentations; poster, a combination of scientific posters and case-based posters, case based, case-based posters. Before 2016, case-based posters and scientific posters combined to form “poster.” 7.0%), and South Korea (64/2,161; 3.0%). However, this varied slightly for each type of presentation. The United States and Canada were consistently the first and second highest contributors each year. The United Kingdom was the third highest contributor in the Walsh and scientific platform categories, but these were of low volume. South Korea was third in the poster presentations category. In considering countries contributing at least 20 NANOS submissions over a 10-year period, the proportion of published abstracts was the highest for Switzerland (14/27; 51.9%), Canada (61/152; 40.1%), and Australia (11/28; 39.3%). The percentage of the total conference abstracts originating from a country is plotted in Figure 4 alongside the respective publication rates. The most frequent journals NANOS abstracts were published in were Journal of Neuro-Ophthalmology, Investigative Ophthalmology & Visual Science, and Neurology (Table 2). The median impact factor was 2.574 (Interquartile Range [IQR] = 2.509, 4.275). The mean time to publication from date of conference was 20.0 (SD = 16.7) months overall. For each category, the times to publication were 19.0 (SD = 14.9) months for Walsh presentations, 20.3 (SD = 19.7) months for scientific platform presentations, and 19.5 (SD = 15.8) months for poster presentations. Overall, 35.2% of published abstracts were published within 1 year and 71.5% were published within 2 years. There was no statistical difference in the time to publication between any of the presentation subgroups. Forty-five percent of the submissions had the same number of authors on the NANOS abstract compared with the subsequent journal publication, but there was a mean increase in the number of authors from the NANOS abstract compared with the final journal publication of 1.31 (SD = 1.28). Figure 5 demonstrates a tabulation of the frequency of each difference in author count. There is an evident inverse relationship between the percentile frequency and the magnitude of the author difference. This was roughly maintained across all 4 categories. First and last authors were listed from different countries in 4.51% (n = 98) of abstracts, and 29.2% (n = 634) of abstracts involved authors from at least 2 different institutions. The median number of institutions involved was 2 (IQR = 1, 3). DISCUSSION Just under one-third of conference abstracts from the 2008 to 2017 NANOS annual meetings were published in peer-reviewed scientific journals with scientific platform presentations having the highest likelihood of publication. We identified 3–4 authors, 5 or more authors, basic science, and sample size of 100 or more as factors associated with a higher likelihood of publication. The top contributors to NANOS abstracts were the United States and Canada consistent with the geographic location and focus of this conference. The Journal of Neuro-Ophthalmology was the home of most published NANOS abstracts, which is also consistent with its role as the official journal of NANOS. On average, time to publication was just under 2 years from the date of the conference, which reflects the time required to incorporate feedback from the conference, prepare the TABLE 1. Multivariate analysis of published presentations indicating which factors increased the likelihood of publication after presentation at the NANOS meetings (2007–2018) Variable No. of authors 3–4 authors 5 or more authors Basic science Sample size 100 or more Financial disclosure Multicenter Yuan et al: J Neuro-Ophthalmol 2021; 41: e692-e698 Odds Ratio (95% Confidence Interval) 1.64 1.81 2.14 1.39 0.99 1.26 (1.24–2.16) (1.36–2.43) (1.01–4.53) (1.02–1.89) (0.70–1.40) (0.99–1.60) P Value 0.001 ,0.001 0.048 0.035 0.95 0.055 e695 Copyright © North American Neuro-Ophthalmology Society. Unauthorized reproduction of this article is prohibited. Original Contribution FIG. 4. Proportion of NANOS abstracts submitted by (A) country of origin of first author and (B) proportion of published abstracts by country. Only countries with at least 20 NANOS submissions over a 10-year period were included in this figure. manuscript, and the peer-review process, which often involves re-submission to multiple journals (14,15). We found that on average just over one author was added to the study at publication, which likely also impacts the time to publication. Publication likelihood was related to presentation category with scientific platform presentations found to have the highest likelihood of publication (67.1%). This is consistent with previous studies, which found oral or paper presentations had a higher likelihood of publication at ophthalmology conferences (10,11,16–18). Our finding likely reflects that more stringent and rigorous criteria are being used for a spot in the oral scientific presentation section of the NANOS meetings, which only accounted for 10.7% of all abstracts. Oral presentations are also likely to have the attention of a larger audience and feedback obtained at the conference may also contribute to this higher success of publication. The higher number of authors in scientific platforms may also be an important factor as more individuals are available for writing and motivating others to publish an article. The high publication rate of scientific platforms suggests that this is a high-yield portion of the conference with respect to a preview of future peer-reviewed publications. However, a previous study on the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine found a major inconsistency in 63% and a minor inconsistency in 81% of abstracts when compared with final publication, suggesting that the oral conference presentations still need to be interpreted with caution (5). The overall NANOS publication rate of 31.5% from 2008 to 2017 is comparable with annual meetings from a wide range of medical specialties, as reported through large e696 systematic reviews and meta-analyses (1–3). The NANOS Annual Meetings abstracts’ publication rate was also similar when compared with conferences in the field of ophthalmology and neurology with previous studies having reported publication rates ranging from 26.6% to 60.6% in well-known conferences, including Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology, COS, AAO, European Association for Vision and Eye Research, American Association of Neurological Surgeons, and the Society of British Neurological Surgeons (4,8–11,17–21). NANOS was also comparable with the neuro-ophthalmology subsection publication rates of 34.8% at the 2012–2013 AAO meeting and 35.0% at the 2010–2015 COS meeting (8,9). Nonetheless, more than two-thirds of NANOS abstracts go unpublished and this may lead to bias when conducting reviews of the literature and valuable scientific information may not enter searchable scientific databases (3). Previous studies have aimed to identify reasons for nonpublication and found inadequate time and inadequate resources consistently cited by abstract authors (22). Although some authors may not see publication as an appropriate goal of their abstract, this may have ethical implications if the abstract involved prospectively recruited study participants who donated their time for scientific advancement. It is also possible that abstracts are not able to pass the peer-review stage and reach publication due to poor quality work. However, negative results should not discourage publication, and editors and reviewers are encouraged to judge manuscripts based on scientific merit, rather than final outcome to avoid publication bias (23–25). Yuan et al: J Neuro-Ophthalmol 2021; 41: e692-e698 Copyright © North American Neuro-Ophthalmology Society. Unauthorized reproduction of this article is prohibited. Original Contribution TABLE 2. Summary of the top 10 journals for article publication of work from the NANOS conference Journal Journal of Neuro-Ophthalmology Investigative Ophthalmology & Visual Science Neurology Ophthalmology JAMA Ophthalmology American Journal of Ophthalmology PLoS One Journal of the Neurological Sciences British Journal of Ophthalmology Eye NANOS abstracts were most often published in the Journal of Neuro-Ophthalmology, indicating that this journal is fulfilling its role as the official journal of NANOS. NANOS abstracts also consistently found their way into top ranked neurology and ophthalmology journals, which is a surrogate marker for scientific quality. The weighted mean impact factor was 2.574 and was comparable to previously mentioned conferences in the fields of ophthalmology and the neurological sciences, which ranged from 1.90 to 3.20 (8,9,16,21). Just like many NANOS abstracts were published in North American-based journals, it is not surprising that NANOS abstracts originated most frequently from the United States and Canada. However, there was an international contribution to the conference, which continues to grow. NANOS recently became a member of the International Council of Ophthalmology, which is a conglomerate of more than 130 national and multinational ophthalmology subspecialty organizations aiming to provide ophthalmic education and training worldwide (26). As neuro-ophthalmology grows internationally, NANOS will also likely have an increasing international presence at the annual meeting. Our study also identified basic science, 3–4 authors, 5 or more authors, and sample size of 100 or more as factors that Number Impact Factor 180 50 41 31 26 24 16 15 14 10 2.509 3.812 8.689 7.732 6.167 4.483 2.776 2.286 3.615 2.366 increased the likelihood of publication. Basic science has previously been found to also be a positive predictor of publication at ophthalmology conferences (8,9,16,18). This may be due to a number of reasons including publication as a universal goal, more funding to support publication, more journals available for publication, and greater resources available to support publication. Basic science researchers may also be more motivated to publish because this is a primary metric for their body of work and important in securing future grants compared with clinicians who may not have the same incentives for this end point. Previous studies in the area of ophthalmology have also found that the involvement of more authors resulted in higher odds of publication (8,10,19). This may be due to higher quality projects, due to larger collaborations, or more resources available to reach publication. In a similar manner, a larger sample size may reflect a higher quality project, larger collaboration, and favorable impressions by journals, which tend to favor larger studies for acceptance. The strengths of this study include the analysis of 10 years of abstract data and the inclusion of a number of potential factors for their role in influencing publications. To the best of our knowledge, the publication rate of NANOS abstracts has FIG. 5. Distribution of differences in number of authors from NANOS abstract to final journal publication. Yuan et al: J Neuro-Ophthalmol 2021; 41: e692-e698 e697 Copyright © North American Neuro-Ophthalmology Society. Unauthorized reproduction of this article is prohibited. Original Contribution not previously been reported. We also searched multiple database to ensure that an exhaustive search for articles was performed. Although we used an automated and novel webscraping algorithm to find publications, this was shown to compare very well to manual searches, which also has limitations and requires intensive resources. Web-scraping is a commonly used tool in the engineering, computer science, and other fields. We also limited our searches to English-language literature, and it is possible that manuscripts were published in other languages given the international participation in NANOS. We included the 2017 conference and our search was performed in April 2020, which was consistent with the timeline used in previous studies and systematic reviews. However, it is possible that papers from this conference are still in preparation and may be published in future dates. CONCLUSIONS In conclusion, of the 2,161 total NANOS abstracts, 681 were published, resulting in an overall publication rate of 31.5%, and this was the highest amount scientific platform presentations (67.1%). Multivariable analysis adjusting for abstract category identified 3–4 authors, 5 or more authors, basic science, and sample size of 100 or more significantly correlated with subsequent publication. The top 3 countries for NANOS submissions overall were the United States, Canada, and South Korea, and the Journal of Neuro-Ophthalmology was the most frequent journal for publication. Conference attendees should be aware that more than two-thirds of abstracts do not reach publication and data at the meeting should be interpreted with caution. Future studies should aim to identify factors contributing to nonpublication to help improve publication of NANOS abstracts. STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP Category 1: a. Conception and design: P. H(S). Yuan and J. A. Micieli; b. Acquisition of data: P. 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