Scientometrics
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2021. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Apr 7, 2021; 27(13): 1341-1353
Published online Apr 7, 2021. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v27.i13.1341
Global research trends in the microbiome related to irritable bowel syndrome: A bibliometric and visualized study
Sa'ed H Zyoud, Simon Smale, W Stephen Waring, Waleed Sweileh, Samah W Al-Jabi
Sa'ed H Zyoud, Poison Control and Drug Information Center (PCDIC), College of Medicine and Health Sciences, An-Najah National University, Nablus 44839, West Bank, Palestine
Sa'ed H Zyoud, Samah W Al-Jabi, Department of Clinical and Community Pharmacy, College of Medicine and Health Sciences, An-Najah National University, Nablus 44839, West Bank, Palestine
Sa'ed H Zyoud, Department of Clinical Research Centre, An-Najah National University Hospital, Nablus 44839, West Bank, Palestine
Simon Smale, Department of Gastroenterology, York Hospital, York Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, York YO31 8HE, United Kingdom
W Stephen Waring, Acute Medical Unit, York Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, York YO31 8HE, United Kingdom
Waleed Sweileh, Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology, College of Medicine and Health Sciences, An-Najah National University, Nablus 44839, West Bank, Palestine
Author contributions: Zyoud SH designed the study, collected the data, analyzed the data, made major contributions to the manuscript’s existing literature search and interpretation, and drafted the manuscript; Al-Jabi SW, and Sweileh W participated in the study design; Smale S and Waring WS contributed towards the conception, wrote part of the article; Al-Jabi SW, Sweileh W, Smale S and Waring WS were involved in interpretation of the data, and made revisions to the initial draft; all authors provided critical review and approved the final manuscript before submission.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors have no financial disclosures or conflicts of interest to declare.
PRISMA 2009 Checklist statement: The authors have read the PRISMA 2009 Checklist, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the PRISMA 2009 Checklist.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Sa'ed H Zyoud, PhD, Associate Professor, Director, Poison Control and Drug Information Center (PCDIC), College of Medicine and Health Sciences, An-Najah National University, Academic Street, Nablus 44839, West Bank, Palestine. saedzyoud@yahoo.com
Received: November 18, 2020
Peer-review started: November 18, 2020
First decision: December 27, 2020
Revised: January 11, 2021
Accepted: March 16, 2021
Article in press: March 16, 2021
Published online: April 7, 2021
Abstract
BACKGROUND

Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is a common functional gastrointestinal disorder. Dysregulation of the gut–brain axis plays a central role in the pathophysiology of IBS. It is increasingly clear that the microbiome plays a key role in the development and normal functioning of the gut–brain axis.

AIM

To facilitate the identification of specific areas of focus that may be of relevance to future research. This study represents a bibliometric analysis of the literature pertaining to the microbiome in IBS to understand the development of this field.

METHODS

The data used in our bibliometric analysis were retrieved from the Scopus database. The terms related to IBS and microbiome were searched in titles or abstracts within the period of 2000–2019. VOSviewer software was used for data visualization.

RESULTS

A total of 13055 documents related to IBS were retrieved at the global level. There were 1872 scientific publications focused on the microbiome in IBS. There was a strong positive correlation between publication productivity related to IBS in all fields and productivity related to the microbiome in IBS (r = 0.951, P < 0.001). The United States was the most prolific country with 449 (24%) publications, followed by the United Kingdom (n = 176, 9.4%), China (n = 154, 8.2%), and Italy (n = 151, 8.1%). The h-index for all retrieved publications related to the microbiome in IBS was 138. The hot topics were stratified into four clusters: (1) The gut–brain axis related to IBS; (2) Clinical trials related to IBS and the microbiome; (3) Drug-mediated manipulation of the gut microbiome; and (4) The role of the altered composition of intestinal microbiota in IBS prevention.

CONCLUSION

This is the first study to evaluate and quantify global research productivity pertaining to the microbiome in IBS. The number of publications regarding the gut microbiota in IBS has continuously grown since 2013. This finding suggests that the future outlook for interventions targeting the gut microbiota in IBS remains promising.

Keywords: Irritable bowel syndrome, Bibliometric, Microbiota, Microbiome, Scopus, Brain gut axis

Core Tip: This is the first study to evaluate and quantify the global research productivity pertaining to the microbiome in irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). We present a holistic picture of this emerging topic and explore future research directions. A number of abnormalities have been described within the microbiome of patients with IBS. The relationships of these abnormalities to the causality of dysfunction and associated symptomatology have not been clearly elucidated. Our finding, while preliminary, suggests that the future outlook for interventions targeting the gut microbiota in IBS remains promising.