Systematic Reviews
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2016. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Hepatol. Nov 28, 2016; 8(33): 1478-1488
Published online Nov 28, 2016. doi: 10.4254/wjh.v8.i33.1478
Bibliometric analysis of top 100 cited articles in nonalcoholic fatty liver disease research
Tong-Shuo Zhang, Hua-Lei Qin, Tong Wang, Hai-Tao Li, Hai Li, Shi-Hai Xia, Xiao-Hui Xiang
Tong-Shuo Zhang, Hua-Lei Qin, Tong Wang, Hai-Tao Li, Hai Li, Shi-Hai Xia, Xiao-Hui Xiang, Department of Hepatopancreatobiliary and Splenic Medicine, Affiliated Hospital, Logistics University of People’s Armed Police Force, Tianjin 300162, China
Author contributions: Zhang TS, Qin HL, Wang T, Li HT, Li H and Xiang XH prepared the manuscript; Xia SH and Xiang XH contributed to the conception of this work, revised and approved the manuscript.
Supported by The National Natural Science Foundation of China, No. 81173393; the Natural Science Foundation of Tianjin City, No. 12JCZDJC25500; and the Innovation Team Program from Logistics University of People’s Armed Police Force, No. WHTD201310.
Conflict-of-interest statement: No conflicts of interest, financial or otherwise, are declared by the authors.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (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/
Correspondence to: Dr. Xiao-Hui Xiang, Department of Hepatopancreatobiliary and Splenic Medicine, Affiliated Hospital, Logistics University of People’s Armed Police Force, 220 Chenglin Road, Hedong District, Tianjin 300162, China. xiaohuixiang@163.com
Telephone: +86-22-60578765 Fax: +86-22-24370605
Received: June 10, 2016
Peer-review started: June 15, 2016
First decision: July 20, 2016
Revised: August 10, 2016
Accepted: September 21, 2016
Article in press: September 22, 2016
Published online: November 28, 2016
Abstract
AIM

To identify and assess the research situation of top 100 cited articles in nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD).

METHODS

The global scientific research articles in the Science Citation Index-Expanded relevant to NAFLD were retrieved and listed according to their citation times from the most to the least. The 100 most frequently cited original articles were selected to systematically evaluate their bibliometric parameters including times cited, publication year, journals, subject categories, and the highly related concepts of NAFLD, which reflected the history and current situation, publication distribution of leading countries and institutes as well as the research hotspots of NAFLD.

RESULTS

Top 100 cited articles in NAFLD were published from 1965 to 2015 with a citation ranging of 227 to 2151 times since publication, in which the United States was the most predominant country and Mayo Clin was the most productive institution. The majority of the top 100 cited articles were concentrated in SCI subject category of Gastroenterology and Hepatology. Hepatology and Gastroenterology is the top journal that published over half 100 top-cited articles. The significant peak of top cited articles present in the first half of the 2000s while the highest mean number of citation presents in first half of the 1980s. In addition, concepts related to pathology characteristics, epidemiology and medicalization, metabolic syndrome and its combination of symptoms including insulin resistance, biomarkers of lipid metabolism and obesity are listed as the highly related concepts.

CONCLUSION

The 100 top-cited articles marked with the leading countries, institutions, journals, hotspots and development trend in NAFLD field that could provide the foundation for further investigations.

Keywords: Bibliometrics, Top-cited articles, Metabolic syndrome, Prevalence, Medicalization, Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease

Core tip: Bibliometrics was used to quantitatively analyze top 100 cited articles from the database of the Science Citation Index Expanded to reveal the global publication trends about nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). This study is the first global look at the history and current situation of NAFLD research to assess the performances of leading countries/territories and institutes and research hotspots of this disease. The performances and research hotspots are related to the potential pathogenesis of NAFLD. Incidence and prevalence as well as treatment progress for NAFLD were systematically reviewed, and their relationships with global performances results were also discussed.