Publication trends and hotspots of drug resistance in colorectal cancer during 2002-2021: A bibliometric and visualized analysis

Abstract

Background: Chemotherapy, radiotherapy, targeted therapy and immunotherapy have demonstrated expected clinical efficacy, while drug resistance remains the predominant limiting factor to therapeutic failure in patients with colorectal cancer (CRC). Although there have been numerous basic and clinical studies on CRC resistance in recent years, few publications utilized the bibliometric method to evaluate this field. The objective of current study was to provide a comprehensive analysis of the current state and changing trends of drug resistance in CRC over the past 20 years.

Methods: The Web of Science Core Collection (WOSCC) was utilized to extracted all studies regarding drug resistance in CRC during 2002-2021. CiteSpace and online platform of bibliometrics were used to evaluate the contributions of various countries/regions, institutions, authors and journals in this field. Moreover, the recent research hotspots and promising future trends were identified through keywords analysis by CiteSpace and VOSviewer.

Results: 1451 related publications from 2002 to 2021 in total were identified and collected. The number of global publications in this field has increased annually. China and the USA occupied the top two places with respect to the number of publications, contributing more than 60% of global publications. Sun Yat-sen University and Oncotarget were the institution and journal which published the most papers, respectively. Bardelli A from Italy was the most prolific writer and had the highest H-index. Keywords burst analysis identified that "Growth factor receptor", "induced apoptosis" and "panitumumab" were the ones with higher burst strength in the early stage of this field. Analysis of keyword emergence time showed that "oxaliplatin resistance", "MicroRNA" and "epithelial mesenchymal transition (EMT)" were the keywords with later average appearing year (AAY).

Conclusions: The number of publications and research interest on drug resistance in CRC have been increasing annually. The USA and China were the main driver and professor Bardelli A was the most outstanding researcher in this field. Previous studies have mainly concentrated on growth factor receptor and induced apoptosis. Oxaliplatin resistance, microRNA and EMT as recently appeared frontiers of research that should be closely tracked in the future.

Keywords: EMT; bibliometric analysis; colorectal cancer; drug resistance; microRNA.

Figure 1

Flow diagram of research selection and screening.

Figure 2

The number of annual publications on drug resistance and colorectal cancer from 2002 to 2021. (A) Global; (B) Top5 Countries or regions.

Figure 3

The contributions of different countries/regions to research concerning drug resistance and colorectal cancer. (A) The number of publications, citation frequency (×0.05), and H-index (×5) in the top 10 countries or regions; (B) The cooperation of countries/regions from 2002 to 2021; more lines emanating from a country indicate closer international cooperation; (C) Top 10 countries with the strongest citation bursts. The blue line represents the time axis, and the red portion on the blue time axis represents the interval at which the burst was found, including the start year, end year, and burst duration.

Figure 4

The contributions of different institutions associated with drug resistance and colorectal cancer. (A) Global institutions collaboration analysis. The nodes represent institutions, and the lines mean connection between them. The publication number is proportional to the size of nodes, and the thickness of the connecting line is proportional to the degree of cooperation. (B) Top 15 institutions with the strongest citation bursts. The blue line represents the time axis, and the red portion on the blue time axis represents the interval at which the burst was found, including the start year, end year, and burst duration.

Figure 5

The contributions of journals in drug resistance and colorectal cancer. (A) Journals co-citation analysis. The nodes represent journals, and the lines mean citations between them. The publication number is proportional to the size of nodes, and the thickness of the connecting line is proportional to the degree of citations. The red core of the nodes represents stronger citation bursts. From 2002 to 2021, the color changed from yellow to green. (B) Top 25 cited journals with the strongest citation bursts. The blue line represents the time axis, and the red portion on the blue time axis The contributions of journals in drug resistance and colorectal cancer. (C) The dual-map overlay of journals related to colorectal cancer drug resistance. On the left were the citing journals, on the right were the cited journals, and the colored path represented the citation relationship.

Figure 6

The contributions of authors in drug resistance and colorectal cancer. (A) Authors co-citation analysis. The nodes represent authors, and the lines mean citations between them. The publication number is proportional to the size of nodes, and the thickness of the connecting line is proportional to the degree of citations. (B) Top 25 authors with the strongest citation bursts. The blue line represents the time axis, and the red portion on the blue time axis represents the interval at which the burst was found, including the start year, end year, and burst duration.

Figure 7

Network visualization diagram of cited references. Cited references are indicated by the node. The nodes represent cited references, and the lines mean citations between them. The citation number is proportional to the size of nodes, and the thickness of the connecting line is proportional to the degree of citations. From 2002 to 2021, the color changed from yellow to green.

Figure 8

(A) The cluster of keywords related to colorectal cancer drug resistance. The different colors represented different clusters. (B) Top 25 keywords with the strongest citation bursts. The blue line represents the time axis, and the red portion on the blue time axis represents the interval at which the burst was found, including the start year, end year, and burst duration.

Figure 9

A timeline view for keywords associated with colorectal cancer drug resistance. The node’s position on the horizontal axis represents the time when the keyword first appeared, and the node’s size is positively correlated with the number of occurrences of the keywords. The lines between the nodes represent co-occurrence relationships. The redder the color means closer to 2021, and the grayer the color means closer to 2002.

Figure 10

Time zone view of keywords (co-occurrence rate ≥40) for colorectal cancer drug resistance. The position of the circles on the horizontal axis represents the year in which the keyword first appeared. The size of the circle reflects the frequency of co-occurrence, and the lines between the circles represent the co-occurrence of two keywords.