Contributions of lumbar spine research in China to the world lumbar medicine

English Keywords:Lumbar spine  China  Bibliometrics  Visual analysis

English Abstract:

  【Abstract】 Objectives: To explore the contributions of lumbar spine research in China to the world. Methods: In the core collection database of Web of Science(WOS), the topic of lumbar spine was searched, and the collected literatures were statistically analyzed by bibliometric method. Lumbar spine research funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China were searched on the GeenMedical database(https://www.geenmedical.com), and lumbar spine research supported by China National Science and Technology Progress Award from 2000 to 2020 were searched from the official website of the National Office for Science and Technology Awards of China(https://www.nosta.gov.cn/web/index.aspx). The literature of lumbar spine research in recent 5 years was visualized by CiteSpace software to analyze the trends of lumbar spine research. Results: In the WOS database, a total of 44381 articles related to lumbar spine research were retrieved. Among them, 4977 were of lumbar disc degeneration, 2977 were of lumbar biomechanics, 5568 were of lumbar disc herniation, 6509 were of lumbar spinal stenosis, 3861 were of lumbar spondylolisthesis, and 1155 were of degenerative scoliosis. Analysis of the number of articles published in the TOP10 countries/regions showed the United States ranked the first with 14742 articles, and China ranked the second with 5432 articles accounting for 12.2% in the world. In regards of the number of articles published in each field of lumbar spine research, China topped the world in lumbar disc herniation and came in second after the United States in other fields. From 2006 to 2019, 91 lumbar spine research projects were funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, totaling a funding amount of 40.23 million yuan, and mainly involving hotspots of lumbar spine degeneration, genes, and biomechanics. From 2000 to 2020, 9 lumbar spine research projects were funded by China National Science and Technology Progress Award, and the research hotspots mainly included spinal deformity, osteoporosis, and lumbar spine minimally invasive surgery. Trends in lumbar spine research over the past five years have focused on lumbar degeneration, lumbar fusion, lumbar stability, principles of surgical treatment, risk factors for surgical failure, machine learning, and minimally invasive surgery. Conclusions: China′s lumbar spine research has made great contributions to the world, which are mainly reflected in the following aspects: Multi-level funding institutions of China vigorously fund researches related to lumbar spine; Many universities and research institutions in China strongly support research related to the lumbar spine; A great of Chinese experts in the field of lumbar spine attach great importance to research on lumbar spine and have published a number of high-level literatures; Several articles of lumbar spine research are highly cited.