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Review
. 2020 Jul 27:13:1901-1913.
doi: 10.2147/JPR.S258739. eCollection 2020.

Research Trends of Acupuncture Therapy on Knee Osteoarthritis from 2010 to 2019: A Bibliometric Analysis

Rongrong Li #  1 , Jing Sun #  1   2 , Hantong Hu  1   2 , Qifei Zhang  1 , Ruohan Sun  1 , Shuning Zhou  1 , Haijuan Zhang  1 , Jianqiao Fang  1   2
Affiliations
Review

Research Trends of Acupuncture Therapy on Knee Osteoarthritis from 2010 to 2019: A Bibliometric Analysis

Rongrong Li et al. J Pain Res. .

Abstract

Background: Acupuncture has been widely applied to relieve knee osteoarthritis (KOA) in many countries. However, the bibliometric analysis of the global use of acupuncture on KOA is largely unknown. Therefore, this study aimed to explore the current status and trends of the global use of acupuncture on KOA in recent 10 years by using CiteSpace (5.6.R3).

Methods: Publications regarding acupuncture therapy for treating KOA between 2010 and 2019 were extracted from the Web of Science database. CiteSpace was used to analyze the number of publications, countries, institutions, journals, authors, cited references and keywords by using standard bibliometric indicators.

Results: A total of 343 publications were retrieved from 2010 to 2019. The total number of publications continually increased over the past four years, and the most active journals, countries, institutions and authors in the field of acupuncture therapy on patients with KOA were identified. The Evid Based Complement Alternat Med (28) was the most prolific journal, and the Ann Intern Med (202) was the most cited journal. The most productive country and institution in this field was China (115) and University of York (18), respectively. Hugh Macpherson (18) was the most prolific author and Witt C ranked the first in the cited authors. In the ranking of frequency in cited reference, the first article was published by Scharf HP (54). The keyword of 'randomized controlled trial' ranked first for research developments with the highest citation burst (3.9486). Besides, there were three main frontiers in keywords for KOA research, including 'research method, 'age' and 'measure of intervention'.

Conclusion: The findings from this bibliometric study provide current status and trends in clinical research of acupuncture therapy on patients with KOA over the past ten years, which may help researchers identify hot topics and explore new directions for future research in this field.

Keywords: CiteSpace; acupuncture; bibliometric analysis; knee osteoarthritis.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors report no conflicts of interest in this work.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
The annual number of publications on acupuncture treatment for KOA between 2010 to 2019.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Cited journal maps related to acupuncture treatment for KOA research from 2010 to 2019. The nodes in the map represent journals, and lines between the nodes represent co-citation relationships. The various colors in the nodes represent the different years. The larger the node area, the greater the number of co-citations. The purple ring represents centrality, and nodes with high centrality are considered as pivotal points in the literature.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Map of countries researching acupuncture for KOA from 2010 to 2019. The nodes in the map represent countries or territories. The lines between the nodes represent cooperation relationships. The various colors in the nodes represent the different years, and the larger the area of the node, the larger the number of publications. The purple ring represents centrality, and nodes with high centrality are considered as pivotal points in the literature.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Map of institutions researching acupuncture for KOA from 2010 to 2019. The nodes in the map represent institutions, and lines between the nodes represent collaborative relationships. The various colors in the nodes represent the different years, and the larger the node area, the larger the number of publications. The purple ring represents centrality, and nodes with high centrality are considered as pivotal points in the literature.
Figure 5
Figure 5
Map of author related to acupuncture for KOA from 2010 to 2019. The nodes in the map represent authors, and lines between the nodes represent the collaborative relationships. The various colors in the nodes represent the different years, and the larger the node area, the greater the number of publications.
Figure 6
Figure 6
Map of cited author related to acupuncture for KOA from 2010 to 2019. The nodes in the map represent co-cited authors, and lines between the nodes represent co-citation relationships. The various colors in the nodes represent the different years. The larger the node area, the greater the number of co-citations. The purple ring represents centrality, and nodes with high centrality are considered to be pivotal points in the literature.
Figure 7
Figure 7
Map of cited references related to acupuncture for KOA from 2010 to 2019. The nodes in the map represent cited references, and lines between the nodes represent co-citation relationships. The various colors in the nodes represent the different years, and the larger the node area, the greater the number of co-citations. The purple ring represents centrality, and nodes with high centrality are considered as pivotal points in the literature.
Figure 8
Figure 8
Map of keywords occurrence related to acupuncture for KOA from 2010 to 2019. The nodes in the map represent keywords. The lines between the nodes represent co-occurrence relationships. The various colors in the nodes represent the different years, and the larger the node area, the higher the frequency. The purple ring represents centrality, and nodes with high centrality are considered as pivotal points in the literature.
Figure 9
Figure 9
Top 15 keywords with the strongest citation bursts. The red bars demonstrated that the keyword was cited frequently, the green bars showed that the keyword was cited infrequently.
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