Progress and Prospects of Recurrent Glioma: A Recent Scientometric Analysis of the Web of Science in 2019
Background Most patients with glioma experience recurrence and have a poor prognosis. Scientometric analysis is effective and widely used to summarize the most influential studies within a certain field. We present the first scientometric analysis of recurrent glioma. Methods We conducted a generalized search for articles on recurrent glioma in the Web of Science database and evaluated the top 100 most cited articles among 4651 articles. Results The number of citations from the top 100 cited articles on recurrent glioma ranged from 149 to 1471; most of these articles were published in oncology specific journals (66) and were submitted by institutions in the United States (n 67) The top cited articles consisted of 98 articles and 2 literature reviews. Articles were classified into 4 major categories based on subject matter: 82 pertained to treatment, 6 pertained to genetic mechanisms, 7 pertained to diagnosis, and 5 pertained to prognosis. Treatment related articles were subdivided into the following 7 categories: targeted therapy (n 21) chemotherapy (n 20) immunotherapy (n 12) combination therapy (n 12) radiotherapy (n 9) surgical resection (n 6) a new therapy (physiotherapy) (n 1) and treatment summary (n 1) Conclusions The results of the analysis indicated that the core problem is the treatment of recurrent glioma. Although the number of citations on targeted therapy and combination therapy has increased in recent years, the proportion of randomized controlled trials, basic medical research, literature reviews, and meta analyses is relatively low; thus, there is an urgent need to conduct these types of studies on recurrent glioma.