Letter to the Editor
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2025. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Methodol. Dec 20, 2025; 15(4): 102000
Published online Dec 20, 2025. doi: 10.5662/wjm.v15.i4.102000
Some comments on using of Web of Science Core Collection for bibliometric studies in volume 29 of the World Journal of Gastroenterology
Yuh-Shan Ho, Ali Ouchi
Yuh-Shan Ho, CT HO Trend, Fuxing N, Taipei 105611, Taiwan
Ali Ouchi, Department of Medical Library and Information Science, School of Management and Medical Informatics, Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Tabriz 5165665931, Iran
Author contributions: All authors contributed important intellectual content to the manuscript, reading and approving the final manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest statement: We declare that we have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
Open Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Ali Ouchi, PhD, Department of Medical Library and Information Science, School of Management and Medical Informatics, Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Golgasht Street, Tabriz 5165665931, Iran. aliochi061@gmail.com
Received: October 4, 2024
Revised: November 7, 2024
Accepted: April 14, 2025
Published online: December 20, 2025
Processing time: 303 Days and 18.8 Hours
Abstract

The authors employed inappropriate search keywords and strategies in their published bibliometric papers within volume 29 of the World Journal of Gastroenterology. The comment highlights the identified issues, provides evidence, and suggests improved study methodologies. Subsequent results with more appropriate search strategies were presented to address the shortcomings.

Keywords: Web of Science Core Collection; Front page; World Journal of Gastroenterology; Search keywords; Bibliometric

Core Tip: Approximately 1% of the documents retrieved directly from searches fell outside the designated search period specified in each paper. Consequently, it can be inferred that using data directly from the Web of Science Core Collection may be inappropriate due to the potential inaccuracies introduced by this discrepancy. Findings strongly suggest that employing quotation marks (“ ”) for search keywords is essential for ensuring more accurate data analysis results in bibliometric studies. Integrating additional pertinent search keywords based on the original papers can indeed refine and enhance the precision of data analysis results in bibliometric studies. By meticulously curating the list of abbreviation terms and removing irrelevant ones, researchers can enhance the precision and accuracy of their bibliometric studies, resulting in more meaningful and insightful findings.