Aims: The purpose of this study is to evaluate an Altmetric analysis of the 50 most cited refractive surgery articles in Ophthalmology journals and to compare them with traditional metrics.
Methods: The term "refractive surgery" was searched, using a time filter between 2010-2020 in the Web of Science core collection database. The 50 most cited articles between 2010 and 2020 were recorded. Descriptive statistics were performed. The Spearman correlation test was used to evaluate the correlation between traditional metrics and Altmetrics.
Results: The Altmetric scores of the top 50 articles ranged from 0 to 25, and the median Altmetric score was 4. The citation numbers of the 50 articles ranged from 83 to 523, and the median citation number was 119.5. The most cited article topic was "Toric Intraocular Lens"; the topics with the highest Altmetric scores were "Toric Intraocular Lens" and "Trifocal Intraocular Lens". There was no significant correlation between Altmetric scores and number of citations. There was a weak correlation between Altmetric scores and the average citation per year.
Conclusion: The Altmetric score is insufficient, compared with traditional metrics, to show the scientific value of articles on refractive surgery. Altmetrics can be used to supplement traditional metrics.