Cost-effectiveness of US National Institute of Health and European Union FP7 Projects on Active Ageing and Elderly Quality of Life-Author's reply

Mauro Giovanni Carta; Michela Atzeni; Alessandra Perra; Quirico Mela; Martina Piras; Giorgia Testa; Germano Orrù; Iskren Kirilov

doi:10.2174/1745017901915010010

Cost-effectiveness of US National Institute of Health and European Union FP7 Projects on Active Ageing and Elderly Quality of Life-Author's reply

Clin Pract Epidemiol Ment Health. 2019 Jan 23:15:10-14. doi: 10.2174/1745017901915010010. eCollection 2019.

Authors

Mauro Giovanni Carta¹, Michela Atzeni¹, Alessandra Perra¹, Quirico Mela¹, Martina Piras², Giorgia Testa², Germano Orrù³, Iskren Kirilov²

Affiliations

¹ Department of Medical Sciences and Public Health, University of Cagliari, Cagliari, Italy.
² Innovation Sciences and Technologies, University of Cagliari, Cagliari, Italy.
³ Department of Surgical Sciences, University of Cagliari, Cagliari, Italy.

Abstract

Background: The use of bibliometric analysis to assess scientific productivity and impact is particularly relevant for EU funding programs. The objective of the present study is to assess the impact on scientific literature by focusing specifically on the cost-effectiveness of FP7 and NHI projects in the fields of AA and QoL, respectively.

Methods: Twenty projects were randomly selected from the CORDIS database in accordance with the following criteria: funded by the FP7; accepted from 1^st January 2007 to 31^st December 2012; concluded by 31^st August 2017;For each project selected, we determined: number of publications in Scopus and Google databases attributable to the project; number of papers published in Q1 quartile of the SCIMAGO rank; number of citations found in Scopus and Scholar Google; amount of funds allocated.

Results: The study has confirmed the results of the previous one, namely that the number of publications and the number of citations per project on active ageing are similar in projects funded by the NHI in the United States and those funded by the FP7 in Europe. However, when it comes to cost-effectiveness, it results that European projects have a cost ten times higher than the Americans ones.

Conclusion: Our study shows lower cost-effectiveness of FP7-European projects than the American-NIH on active aging. The results of this research, albeit with the limits already outlined, will have to be taken into consideration in the evaluative research of the future.