Frontiers of ankylosing spondylitis research: an analysis from the top 100 most influential articles in the field

Ankylosing spondylitis (AS) is a chronic inflammatory disease that frequently results in disability. It has a negative impact on patients' quality of life and puts an enormous budgetary and societal burden on society. The most effective treatment for AS has grown to be a significant issue worldwide. In order to pinpoint research focus and trends in this region, we performed a bibliometric analysis of the top 100 cited papers in this study. We searched the Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI-Expanded) on the Web of Science (WOS) and selected the top 100 cited papers based on AS. The pertinent literature from various years, journals, nations/regions, institutions, authors, keywords, and references were then examined. To construct knowledge maps, we used the VOSviewer, CiteSpace, and Scimago Graphica programs. Excel was then used to compile the information from the pertinent literature that we had retrieved, and we were able to make predictions about the focus and trends that were currently occurring in the field. Between 1999 and 2019, the top 100 cited papers appeared in 23 journals from 36 different nations and regions. Annals of the rheumatic diseases published the majority of the articles, while Lancet had the highest average number of citations per paper. Germany contributed the most publications, followed by the Netherlands and the USA. In terms of the total number of publications, Rheumazentrum Ruhrgebiet contributed the most papers, followed by University Hospital Maastricht and Leiden University. The three major categories are Rheumatology, Medicine, General & Internal, and Genetics & Heredity, whereas the top 5 co-occurrence of keywords included rheumatoid arthritis, double-blind, disease activity, efficacy, and infliximab. The cluster analysis results indicate that inflammation and immunology, safe and effective therapies, and placebo-controlled trials may be focus and trends for future AS research. Bibliometric analysis can swiftly and visually identify the focus and boundaries of AS research. Our findings imply that inflammation and immunology, safe and effective therapies, and placebo-controlled trials may be focus and trends for future AS research.