Bone morphogenetic proteins in spine surgery: a scientometric analysis to date

Bone morphogenetic proteins (BMPs) are part of the transforming growth factor-beta superfamily and are involved in bone formation and repair. In spine surgery, recombinant human BMP (rhBMP) is used as an alternative to autografts for spinal fusions. This study aimed to evaluate bibliometric parameters and citations of the literature on BMPs to provide an overview of how the field has evolved.

A comprehensive search of the literature was conducted using Elsevier's Scopus database to capture all the published and indexed studies relevant to BMPs from 1955 to the present. A discrete set of validated bibliometric parameters was extracted and analyzed. All statistical analyses were performed using R 4.1.1.

The 100 most cited articles were published between 1994 and 2018 by 472 unique authors in 40 sources (e.g., journals and books). On average, there were 279 citations per publication and 17.69 citations per publication per year. The United States had the publications with the most citations (n = 23,761), followed by Hong Kong (n = 580) and the United Kingdom (n = 490). The three institutions in the United States with the greatest number of publications in the field were Emory University (n = 14), Hughston Clinic (n = 9), Hospital for Special Surgery (n = 6), and University of California (n = 6).

The authors evaluated and characterized the 100 most cited articles about BMP. Most of the publications were clinical in nature and focused on BMP's application in spine surgery. While early scientific efforts focused on basic science research to advance the understanding of BMP's mechanism of action in promoting bone formation, the majority of the more recent publications are clinically focused. It will be beneficial to conduct more controlled clinical trials to compare the outcomes of BMP use with other methods.