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Review
. 2025 Jul 10;17(7):e87688.
doi: 10.7759/cureus.87688. eCollection 2025 Jul.

A Bibliometric Analysis on Research Trends in Paediatric Epilepsy Treatment From 2005 to 2025

Oliver Squires  1
Affiliations
Review

A Bibliometric Analysis on Research Trends in Paediatric Epilepsy Treatment From 2005 to 2025

Oliver Squires. Cureus. .

Abstract

The objective of this bibliometric analysis was to evaluate trends in paediatric epilepsy treatment research from 2005 to 2025. Through assessing which journals, countries, authors, and institutions have been the most productive and mapping trends in keywords used over time, the study aims to reveal emerging areas of interest and inspire ideas for future research. A total of 1418 relevant documents were retrieved from the Web of Science database. Documents outside of the target time period and non-English documents were excluded. From the 1152 remaining documents, 17 duplicates were removed using OpenRefine (OpenRefine). The final 1135 documents were then analysed using VosViewer (VOSviewer - Visualizing scientific landscapes) and Bibliometrix (https://www.bibliometrix.org/). The analysis revealed a stable number of annual global publications until a notable increase since 2018. The USA leads the way with the greatest research output (298 articles) and the highest number of total citations (6565). Harvard University emerged as the most productive institution (111 articles), whilst Epilepsia was the most productive journal (253 articles). Keyword co-occurrence analysis revealed a shift in research from earlier documents focusing more on traditional drug therapies to more recent articles focusing on cannabidiol based therapies, laser ablation, and vagal nerve stimulation. This bibliometric analysis provides new insights into the evolution of paediatric epilepsy treatment research. It helps to demonstrate the leading contributors in the field over the last 20 years, as well as highlighting emerging new trends. The results of the analysis underline the shift in the research away from more traditional treatments to investigating alternative therapies, including cannabidiol based therapies, dietary interventions, laser ablation, and vagal nerve stimulation. Through identifying these trends in the research and mapping author collaboration networks, it is hoped that this study can provide a foundational reference for researchers when planning future studies.

Keywords: anti-epileptic; childhood; intervention; management; seizure; therapy.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflicts of interest: In compliance with the ICMJE uniform disclosure form, all authors declare the following: Payment/services info: All authors have declared that no financial support was received from any organization for the submitted work. Financial relationships: All authors have declared that they have no financial relationships at present or within the previous three years with any organizations that might have an interest in the submitted work. Other relationships: All authors have declared that there are no other relationships or activities that could appear to have influenced the submitted work.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1. PRISMA flow chart to demonstrate the selection process for articles included in this study
The flow chart is created by the author based on the 2020 Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines.
Figure 2
Figure 2. A graph to show the number of articles published per year
The graph is created by the author.
Figure 3
Figure 3. A co-authorship analysis map showing links between the countries of different authors
The image was created bythe author using the VOSviewer software (available at https://www.vosviewer.com).
Figure 4
Figure 4. A map reflecting the number of articles published by different countries across the globe
The image was generated by the author using the Bibliometrix package (v3.0.4; https://www.bibliometrix.org/) [12]. A legend was then manually added to the exported image by the author.
Figure 5
Figure 5. A co-authorship map showing relationships between authors
The image was created by the author using the VOSviewer software (available at https://www.vosviewer.com).
Figure 6
Figure 6. A keyword co-occurrence map showing the most common words used and their relationship with other commonly occurring words
The image was created by the author using the VOSviewer software (available at https://www.vosviewer.com).
Figure 7
Figure 7. A keyword co-occurrence map showing changes in trends of commonly used keywords over time
The image was created by the author using the VOSviewer software (available at https://www.vosviewer.com).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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