Traumatic spinal cord and spinal column injuries: A bibliometric analysis of the 200 most cited articles

Study Design: Bibliometric analysis. Objectives: This study aimed to highlight the 200 most influential articles related to traumatic spinal cord and spinal column injuries and provide an insight of past and current global trends in spinal trauma research. Methods: The Web of Science database was used to identify the top 200 most cited articles on the topic of traumatic spinal cord injury (SCI) and spinal column injuries between using a prespecified algorithm. The articles were manually reviewed; bibliometrics were collected on title, first and corresponding authors' country, institution, journal, publication year, and citation data. Results: The search string yielded 30,551 articles during 1977–2019. The average time from the publication was 19.5 years. A total of 1356 authors contributed to 67 different journals, the top 200 most cited articles amassing a total of 88,115 citations and an average 440.6 citations. The United States of America (USA) contributed the most with 110 articles; the top institution was the University of Toronto with 34 publications. Most studies focused on basic science research on SCI. Keyword analysis revealed the most commonly used keywords: SCI, inflammation, apoptosis, incidence/prevalence, and regeneration; four word-clusters were identified. Institutions from the USA and Canada collaborated the most and two major and two minor institutional collaboration subnetworks were identified. Co-citation analysis detected three main clusters of authors. Conclusion: This overview of the most cited articles on traumatic spinal cord and spinal column injuries provides insight into the international spinal trauma community and the terrain in this field, potentially acting as a springboard for further collaboration development.