Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jul 4, 2025
Author Spotlight: 3D Movement Assessment of Maxillary Posterior Teeth in Clear Aligner Treatment
Published on: February 23, 2024
Bibliometric and visualized analysis of randomized controlled trials in orthodontics between 1991 and 2022
Shuhua Wang1, Di Fu2, Ling Zou2
1State Key Laboratory of Oral Diseases & National Center for Stomatology & National Clinical Research Center for Oral Diseases, Department of Orthodontics, West China Hospital of Stomatology, Sichuan University, Chengdu, Sichuan, China.
Introduction:
In many evidence-based approaches to orthodontic research, randomized controlled trials (RCTs) represent authoritative evidence to identify rational therapeutics. This study aimed to perform mappings of bibliometric networks on orthodontic RCTs and summarize visual characteristics between 1991 and 2022.
Methods:
The articles were retrieved from the Web of Science Core Collection in October 2022 without an initial time limit. Only orthodontic RCTs were eligible. Some bibliometric tools (HistCite, VOSviewer, SCImago Graphica, and CiteSpace) were applied for visualized analysis. Data such as geography, productive institutions, hot articles, journals, authors, references, and keywords were extracted and summarized for analysis.
Results:
A total of 1122 orthodontic RCTs were searched. A total of 3841 authors from 1157 institutions in 65 countries published orthodontic RCTs. The United States (149) was the most prolific country, and the University of Sao Paulo (35) was the most productive institution. The American Journal of Orthodontics and Dentofacial Orthopedics (206) was the most popular journal for scholars. The visualization results of keyword co-occurrence identified 5 clusters: (1) tooth movement and auxiliary measures, (2) appliances and oral health, (3) orthodontic discomfort and symptomatic therapy, (4) periodontal disease in orthodontics and health maintenance, and (5) retention and relapse.
Conclusions:
Over the past 31 years, publications and citations on orthodontic RCTs from the Web of Science Core Collection have increased notably across many countries, authors, and institutions. Recently, there has been a significant increase in the attention to orthodontic RCTs that focus on accelerating tooth movement.
